es pockets, staring with his
little round eyes on the doctor, I must confess, with a very foolish and
rather guilty vacuity all over his plump face, rigid and speechless, for
three or four seconds; then he put his hand, which did actually tremble,
upon the doctor's arm, and he said, very thickly--

'I feel, Sir, you're right; it is my fault, Sir, I've poisoned him
--merthiful goodneth!--I--I--'

Puddock's address acted for a moment on O'Flaherty. He came up to him
pale and queer, like a somnambulist, and shook his fingers very
cordially with a very cold grasp.

'If it was the last word I ever spoke, Puddock, you're a
good-natured--he's a gentleman, Sir--and it was _all_ my own fault; he
warned me, he did, again' swallyin' a dhrop of it--remember what I'm
saying, doctor--'twas _I_ that done it; I was _always_ a botch, Puddock,
an' a fool; and--and--gentlemen--good-bye.'

And the flowered dressing-gown and ungartered stockings disappeared
through the door into the bed-room, from whence they heard a great souse
on the bed, and the bedstead gave a dismal groan.

'Is there;--_is_ there nothing, doctor--for mercy's sake, think--doctor,
do--I conjure you--pray think--there must be something'--urged Puddock,
imploringly.

'Ay, that's the way, Sir, fellows quacking themselves and one another;
when they get frightened, and with good reason, come to us and expect
miracles; but as in this case, the quantity was not very much, 'tis not,
you see, overpowering, and he _may_ do if he takes what I'll send him.'

Puddock was already at his bedside, shaking his hand hysterically, and
tumbling his words out one over the other--

'You're thafe, my dear Thir--_dum thpiro thpero_--he thayth--Dr.
Thturk--he can thave you, my dear Thir--my dear lieutenant--my dear
O'Flaherty--he can thave you, Thir--thafe and thound, Thir.'

O'Flaherty, who had turned his face to the wall in the bitterness of his
situation--for like some other men, he had the intensest horror of death
when he came peaceably to his bedside, though ready enough to meet him
with a 'hurrah!' and a wave of his rapier, if he arrived at a moment's
notice, with due dash and eclat--sat up like a shot, and gaping upon
Puddock for a few seconds, relieved himself with a long sigh, a
devotional upward roll of the eyes, and some muttered words, of which
the little ensign heard only 'blessing,' very fervently, and 'catch me
again,' and 'divil bellows it;' and forthwith out came one