“You little ass!” said the doctor. “What do you mean by coming with your ridiculous stories here?”
Mannering stretched out his thin hand and took the paper. “You see,” he said, with a faint laugh, “how right I was when I said I would have nothing to do with your changes of air. It is all that my pay will do to settle my bills, and no overplus for such vanities.”
“Nonsense, Mannering! The money will be forthcoming when it is known to be necessary.”
“From what quarter, I should be glad to hear? Do you think the Museum will grant me a premium for staying away, for being of no use? Not very likely! I shall not be left in the lurch; they will grant me three months’ holiday, or even six months’ holiday, and my salary as usual. But we shall have to reduce our expenses, Dora and I, and to live as quietly as possible, instead of going off like millionaires to revel upon fresh tipples of fancy air. No, no, nothing of the kind. And, besides, I don’t believe in them. I have made myself, as the French say, to the air of Bloomsbury, and in that I shall live or die.”
“You don’t speak at all, my dear fellow, like the man of sense you are,” said the doctor. “Fortunately, I can carry things with a high hand. When I open my mouth let no patient venture to contradict. You are going away to the country now. If you don’t conform to my rules, I am not at all sure I may not go further, and ordain that there is to be no work for six months, a winter on the Riviera, and so forth. I have got all these pains and penalties in my hand.”
“Better and better,” said Mannering, “a palace to live in, and a chef to cook for us, and our dinner off gold plate every day.”
“There is no telling what I may do if you put me to it,” Dr. Roland said, with a laugh. “But seriously, if it were my last word, you must get out of London. Nothing that you can do or say will save you from that.”
“We shall see,” said Mr. Mannering. “The sovereign power of an empty purse does great wonders. But here is Dora back, and without the big book, I am glad to see. What did Fiddler say?”
“I will tell you afterwards, father,” said Dora, developing suddenly a little proper pride.
“Nonsense! You can tell me now—that he had two or three people in his pocket who would have bought it willingly if he had not reserved it for me, and that it was a book that nobody wanted, and would be a drug on his hands.”