A muttering, dissatisfied sound, but half articulate, seemed to say, "No better."

"It ain't to be expected yet," said Quackinboss. "Lie down, and be quiet a bit."

Although the first effect of the bleeding seemed to calm the sufferer and arrest his fever, the symptoms of the malady came back in full force afterwards, and, ere day broke, he was raving wildly. At one moment he fancied he was at work in the laboratory with his father, and he ran over great calculations of mental arithmetic with a marvellous volubility; then he was back in his chambers at Trinity, but he could not find his books; they were gone--lost--no, not lost, he suddenly remembered that he had sold them--sold them to send a pittance to his poor sick mother. "It's a sad story, every part of it," whispered he in Quackinboss's ear, while he clutched him closely with his hands. "It was a great man was lost, mark you; and in a great shipwreck even the fragments of the wreck work sad destruction, and, of course, none will say a word for him. But remember, sir, I am his son, and will not hear a syllable against him, from you nor any other." From this he abruptly broke off to speak of O'Shea, and his late altercation with him. "I waited at home all the morning for him, and at last got a note to say that he had forgotten to tell me of an appointment he had made to ride out with Miss Leslie, but he 'll be punctual to the hour to-morrow. So it's better as it is, Colonel, for you 'll be here, and can act as my friend,--won't you? Your countrymen understand all these sort of things so well. And then, if I be called away suddenly to England, don't tell them," whispered he, mysteriously,--"don't tell them at the villa whither I 've gone. They know nothing of me nor of my family; never heard of my ruined father, nor my poor, sick, destitute mother, dying of actual want,--think of that,--while I was playing the man of fortune here, affecting every extravagance,--yes, it was you yourself said so; I overheard you in the garden, asking why or how was it, with such ample means, I would become a tutor."

It was not alone that these words were uttered in a calm and collected tone, but they actually recalled to the American a remark he had once made about Layton. "Well," said he, as if some apology was called for, "it warn't any business of mine, but I was sorry to see it."

"But you didn't know--you couldn't know," cried the other, eagerly, "that I had no choice; my health was breaking. I had overworked my head; I could n't go on. Have you ever tried what it is to read ten hours a day? Answer me that."

"No; but I've been afoot sixteen out of the twenty-four for weeks together, on an Indian trail; and that's considerable worse, I take it."

"Who cares for mere fatigue of body?" said Layton, contemptuously.

"And who says it's mere fatigue of body?" rejoined the other, "when every sense a man has is strained and stretched to breakin', his ear to the earth, and his eyes rangin' over the swell of the prairies, till his brain aches with the strong effort; for, mark ye, Choctaws isn't Pawnees: they 're on you with a swoop, just like a white squall in the summer time." There is no saying how far Quackinboss, notwithstanding all his boasted skill in physic, might have been tempted to talk on about a theme he loved so well, when he was suddenly admonished, by the expression of Layton's face, that the sick man was utterly unconscious of all around him. The countenance had assumed that peculiar stern and stolid gaze which is so markedly the characteristic of an affected brain.

"There," muttered Quackinboss to himself, "I 've been a-talkin' all this time to a poor creetur as is ravin' mad; all I 've been doin' is to make him worse."

CHAPTER XVII. A MASTER AND MAN

Who owns the smart tandem that trips along so flippantly over the slightly frosted road from the Bagni towards Lucca? What genius, cunning in horseflesh, put that spicy pair together, perfect matches as they are in all but color, for the wheeler is a blood chestnut, and the leader a bright gray, with bone and substance enough for hunters? They have a sort of lithe and wiry action that reminds one of the Hungarian breed, and so, indeed, a certain jaunty carriage of the head, and half wild-looking expression of eye, bespeak them. The high dog-cart, however, is unmistakably English, as well as the harness, with its massive mountings and broad straps. What an air of mingled elegance and solidity pervades the entire! It is, as it were, all that such an equipage can pretend to compass,--lightness, speed, and a dash of sporting significance being its chief characteristics.

It is not necessary to present you to the portly gentleman who holds the ribbons, all encased as he is in box-coats and railway wrappers; you can still distinguish Mr. O'Shea, and as unmistakably recognize his man Joe beside him. The morning is sharp, clear, and frosty, but so perfectly still that the blue smoke of Mr. O'Shea's cigar hangs floating in the air behind him, as the nimble nags spin along at something slightly above thirteen miles an hour. Joe, too, solaces himself with the bland weed, but in more primitive fashion, from a short "dudeen" of native origin: his hat is pressed down firmly over his brows, and his hands, even to the wrists, deeply encased in his pockets, for Joe, be it owned, is less amply supplied with woollen comforts than his master, and feels the morning sharp.

"Now, I call this a very neat turn-out; the sort of thing a man might not be ashamed to tool along through any town in Europe," said O'Shea.

"You might show it in Sackville Street!" said Joe, proudly.

"Sackville Street?" rejoined O'Shea, in an accent of contemptuous derision. "Is there any use, I wonder, in bringing you all over the world?"

"There is not," said the other, in his most dogged manner.

"If there was," continued O'Shea, "you'd know that Dublin had no place amongst the great cities of Europe,--that nobody went there,--none so much as spoke of it. I 'd just as soon talk of Macroom in good society."

"And why would n't you talk of Macroom? What's the shame in it?" asked the inexorable Joe.

"There would be just the same shame as if I was to bring you along with me when I was asked out to dinner!"

"You might do worse," was the dry reply.

"I 'm curious to hear how."

"Troth, you might; and easy too," said Joe, sententiously.

These slight passages did not seem to invite conversation, and so, for above a mile or two, nothing was spoken on either side. At last Mr.

O'Shea said,--

"I think that gray horse has picked up a stone; he goes tenderly near side."

"He does not; he goes as well as you do," was Joe's answer.

"You're as blind as a bat, or you'd see he goes lame," said O'Shea, drawing up.

"There, he's thrown it now; it was only a bit of a pebble," said Joe, as though the victory was still on his side.

"Upon my life, I wonder why I keep you at all," burst out O'Shea, angrily.

"So do I; and I wonder more why I stay."

"Does it ever occur to you to guess why?"

"No; never."

"It has nothing to say to being well fed, well lodged, well paid, and well cared for?"

"No; it has not," said Joe, gravely. "The bit I ate, I get how I can; these is my own clothes, and sorrow sixpence I seen o' your money since last Christmas."

"Get down,--get down on the road this instant. You shall never sit another mile beside me."

"I will not get down. Why would I, in a strange counthry, and not a farthin' in my pocket!"

"Have a civil tongue, then, and don't provoke me to turn you adrift on the world."

"I don't want to provoke you."

"What beastly stuff is that you are smoking?" said O'Shea, as a whole cloud from Joe's pipe came wafted across him.

"'Tis n't bastely at all. I took it out of your own bag this morning."

"Not out of the antelope's skin?" asked O'Shea, eagerly.

"Yes; out of the hairy bag with the little hoofs on it."

A loud burst of laughter was O'Shea's reply, and for several seconds he could not control his mirth.

"Do you know what you're smoking! It's Russian camomile!"

"Maybe it is."

"I got it to make a bitter mixture."

"It's bitther, sure enough, but it has a notion of tobacco too."

O'Shea again laughed out, and longer than before.

"It's just a chance that you were n't poisoned," said he, at last.

"Here--here's a cigar for you, and a real Cuban, too, one that young Heathcote never fancied would grace your lips."