What could that mean?
Had the old man determined to avenge the slight, and to do so on his father, by claiming some old debt?
There might be many between him and the doctor.

And Tom's heart beat fast, as Jane put a letter into his hand.
"No answer, sir, the clerk says." Tom opened it, and turned over the contents more than once ere he could believe his own eyes.
It was neither more nor less than a cheque on Mark's London banker for just five hundred pounds.
A half-sheet was wrapped round it, on which were written these words:-- "To Thomas Thurnall, Esq., for behaving like a gentleman.

The cheque will be duly honoured at Messrs.

Smith, Brown, and Jones, Lombard Street.

No acknowledgment is to be sent.