Page:Cuthbert Bede--Little Mr Bouncer and Tales of College Life.djvu/256

236 you know you ought to be now, you naughty boy!" replied the Doctor.

"Is that your advice?" asked the Patient.

"Yes," said the Doctor.

"Thank you," rejoined the Patient; "I feel indebted to you. There is Dr. Love's fee!" and the Ghost positively seized upon the young lady, and kissed her!—at least he appeared to kiss her; but we had rather not commit ourselves to the declaration that his osculatory intentions were fully carried out.

"There, Sir! that is quite enough! I did not ask you to pay me in that fashion!" said Dr. Love, with a quickened breath, and a heightened flush—(so, perhaps, after all, the Ghost did kiss the young lady!) "It is fortunate for you that you did not meet your Papa here. What ever would he say if he knew you were in London—much more in Wilton Crescent?"

"Oh! he does know it," said the Ghost, calmly; "I met him at Hyde Park Corner, and, thinking that honesty was the best policy, I told him that I was on my way to Wilton Crescent."

"I admire your boldness!" remarked Doctor Love. "And was he very angry?"

"Not more so than the Old Boy usually is on this subject," replied the Patient. "He roared me 'an' 't were any nightingale.' Ahem! Shakspeare!"

"But," asked Doctor Love, "was he not horrified to find your Ghostship in London, when he thought you were lying ill in Oxford?"

"Slightly horrified, and fearfully disgusted!" replied the Ghost. "But then, you see, my dear Fanny, that it was not me that he met. At least, he would have it that it was me. But it must have been some one very like