“My name is Frank Headley, Curate of the Parish,” said Frank, smiling:  though he saw the man was rattling on for the purpose of preventing his talking on serious matters.

“And mine is Tom Thurnall, F.R.C.S., Licentiate of the Universities of Paris, Glasgow, and whilome surgeon of the good clipper Hesperus, which you saw wrecked last night.  So, farewell!”

“Come over with me, and have some breakfast.”

“No, thanks; you’ll be busy.  I’ll screw some out of old bottles here.”

“And now,” said Tom Thurnall to himself, as Frank left the room, “to begin life again with an old penknife and a pound of honeydew.  I wonder which of them got my girdle.  I’ll stick here till I find out that one thing, and stop the notes by to-day’s post if I can but recollect them all;—­if I could but stop the nugget, too!”

So saying, he walked down into the surgery, and looked round.  Everything was in confusion.  Cobwebs were over the bottles, and armies of mites played at bo-peep behind them.  He tried a few drawers, and found that they stuck fast; and when he at last opened one, its contents were two old dried-up horse-balls, and a dirty tobacco-pipe.  He took down a jar marked Epsom salts, and found it full of Welsh snuff; the next, which was labelled cinnamon, contained blue vitriol.  The spatula and pill-roller were crusted with deposits of every hue.  The pill-box drawer had not a dozen whole boxes in it; and the counter was a quarter of an inch deep in deposit of every vegetable and mineral matter, including ends of string, tobacco ashes, and broken glass.

Tom took up a dirty duster, and set to work coolly to clear up, whistling away so merrily that he brought in Heale.

“I’m doing a little in the way of business, you see.”

“Then you really are a professional practitioner, sir, as Mr. Headley informs me:  though, of course, I don’t doubt the fact?” said Heale, summoning up all the little courage he had, to ask the question with.

“F.R.C.S.  London, Paris, and Glasgow.  Easy enough to write and ascertain the fact.  Have been medical officer to a poor-law union, and to a Brazilian man-of-war.  Have seen three choleras, two army fevers, and yellow-jack without end.  Have doctored gunshot wounds in the two Texan wars, in one Paris revolution, and in the Schleswig-Holstein row; beside accident practice in every country from California to China, and round the world and back again.  There’s a fine nest of Mr. Weekes’s friend (if not creation), Acarus Horridus,” and Tom went on dusting and arranging.

Heale had been fairly taken aback by the imposing list of acquirements, and looked at his guest awhile with considerable awe:  suddenly a suspicion flashed across him, which caused him (not unseen by Tom) a start and a look of self-congratulatory wisdom.  He next darted out of the shop, and returned as rapidly, rather redder about the eyes, and wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.