Aaron noticed this.
“Don’t exert yourself too much, Tom; take it coolly, man, and thank God that you are now fairly round the corner. Is your head painful?”
“No—why should it?”
Mr Fyall smiled, and I put up my hand—it was all I could do, for my limbs appeared loaded with lead at the extremities, and when I touched any part of my frame, with my hand for instance, there was no concurring sensation conveyed by the nerves of the two parts; sometimes I felt as if touched by the hand of another; at others, as if I had touched the person of some one else. When I raised my hand to my forehead, my fingers instinctively moved to take hold of my hair, for I was in no small degree proud of some luxuriant brown curls, which the women used to praise. Alas and alack-a-day! in place of ringlets, glossy with Macassar oil, I found a cool young tender plantain-leaf bound round my temples.
“What is all this?” said I. “A kale-blade, where my hair used to be!”
“How came this kale-blade here, And how came it here?”
Sung friend Bang, laughing, for he had great powers of laughter, and I saw he kept his quizzical face turned towards some object at the head of the bed, which I could not see.
“You may say that, Aaron—where’s my wig, you rogue, eh?”
“Never mind, Tom,” said Fyall, “your hair will soon grow again, won’t it, miss?”
“Miss! miss!” and I screwed my neck round, and lo!—“Ah, Mary, and are you the Delilah who have shorn my locks—you wicked young female lady you!”