“I staid last night at General Witherington's,” answered Hartley, “because he is extremely ill.”
“Tell him to repent of his sins, then,” said Richard. “Old Gray used to say, a doctor had as good a title to give ghostly advice as a parson. Do you remember Doctor Dulberry, the minister, calling him an interloper? Ha! Ha! Ha!”
“I am surprised at this style of language from one in your circumstances.”
“Why, ay,” said Middlemas, with a bitter smile—“it would be difficult to most men to keep up their spirits, after gaining and losing father, mother, and a good inheritance, all in the same day. But I had always a turn for philosophy.”
“I really do not understand you, Mr. Middlemas.”
“Why, I found my parents yesterday, did I not?” answered the young man. “My mother, as you know, had waited but that moment to die, and my father to become distracted; and I conclude both were contrived purposely to cheat me of my inheritance, as he has taken up such a prejudice against me.”
“Inheritance?” repeated Hartley, bewildered by Richard's calmness, and half suspecting that the insanity of the father was hereditary in the family. “In Heaven's name, recollect yourself, and get rid of these hallucinations. What inheritance are you dreaming of?”
“That of my mother, to be sure, who must have inherited old Moncada's wealth—and to whom should it descend, save to her children?—I am the eldest of them—that fact cannot be denied.”
“But consider, Richard—recollect yourself.”
“I do,” said Richard; “and what then?”