You must excuse my uncle, Sir Everard," he added in a lower tone, drawing him a little towards the door, "if his manners are a little gruff.

He is devoted to Lady Dominey, and I sometimes think that he broods over her case too much." Dominey nodded and turned back into the room to find the doctor, his hands in his old-fashioned breeches pockets, eyeing him steadfastly.
"I find it very hard to believe," he said a little curtly, "that you are really Everard Dominey." "I am afraid you will have to accept me as a fact, nevertheless." "Your present appearance," the old man continued, eyeing him appraisingly, "does not in any way bear out the description I had of you some years ago.

I was told that you had become a broken-down drunkard." "The world is full of liars," Dominey said equably.

"You appear to have met with one, at least." "You have not even," the doctor persisted, "the appearance of a man who has been used to excesses of any sort." "Good old stock, ours," his visitor observed carelessly.

"Plenty of two-bottle men behind my generation." "You have also gained courage since the days when you fled from England.
You slept at the Hall last night ?" "Where else?
I also, if you want to know, occupied my own bedchamber--with results," Dominey added, throwing his head a little back, to display the scar on his throat, "altogether insignificant." "That's just your luck," the doctor declared.