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ON HIS WAY THROUGH THE WORLD 203
"At—at Mrs. Brandon's, father." He blushes like a girl as
he speaks.
At the next moment he is scared by the execration which hisses
from his father's lips, and the awful look of hate which the elder's
face assumes—that fatal, forlorn, falleu, lost look which, man and
boy, has often frightened poor Phil. Philip did not like that look,
nor indeed that other one, which his father cast at Hunt, who
presently swaggered in.
"What! you dine here? We rarely do papa the honour of
dining with him," says the parson, with his knowing leer. " I
suppose, Doctor, it is to be fatted-calf day now the prodigal has
come home. There's worse things than a good fillet of veal ; eh ?"
Whatever the meal might be, the greasy chaplain leered and
winked over it as he gave it his sinister blessing. The two elder
guests tried to be lively and gay, as Philip thought, who took such
little trouble to disguise his own moods of gloom or merriment.
Nothing was said regarding the occurrences of the morning when
my young gentleman had been rather rude to Mr. Hunt; and
Philip did not need his father's caution to make no mention of his
previous meeting with their guest. Hunt, as usual, talked to the
butler, made sidelong remarks to the footman, and garnished his
conversation with slippery double-entendre and dirty old-world slang.
Betting-houses, gambling-houses, Tattersall's, fights and their frequenters,
were his cheerful themes, and on these he descanted as
usual. The Doctor swallowed this dose, which his friend poured
out, without the least expression of disgust. On the contrary, he
was cheerful : he was for an extra bottle of claret—it never could
be in better order than it was now.
The bottle was scarce put on the table, and tasted and pronounced
perfect, when—oh ! disappointment !—the butler reappears
with a note for the Doctor. One of his patients. He must go.
She has little the matter with her. She lives hard by, in Mayfair.
" You and Hunt finish this bottle, unless I am back before it is
done; and if it is done, we'll have another," says Dr. Firmin
jovially. "Don't stir, Hunt"—and Dr. Firmin is gone, leaving
Philip alone with the guest to whom he had certainly been rude in
the morning.
"The Doctor's patients often grow very unwell about claret
time," growls Mr. Hunt, some few minutes after. " Never mind.
The drink's good—good! as somebody said at your famous callsupper,
Mr. Philip—won't call you Philip, as you don't like it.
You were uncommon crusty to me in the morning, to be sure. In
my time there would have been bottles broke, or worse, for that
sort of treatment."