Wilkie Collins

A House to Let Wilkie Collins

I had been living at Tunbridge Wells and nowhere else, going on for ten years, when my medical man-very clever in his profession, and the prettiest player I ever saw in my life of a hand at Long Whist, which was a noble and a princely game before Short was heard of-said to me, one day, as he sat feeling my pulse on the actual sofa which my poor dear sister Jane worked before her spine came on, and laid her on a board for fifteen months at a stretch-the most upright woman that ever lived-said to me, "What we want, ma'am, is a fillip." "Good gracious, goodness gracious, Doctor Towers!" says I, quite startled at the man, for he was so christened himself: "don't talk as if you were alluding to people's names; but say what you mean." "I mean, my dear ma'am, that we want a little change of air and scene." "Bless the man!" said I; "does he mean we or me!" "I mean you, ma'am." "Then Lard forgive you, Doctor Towers," I said; "why don't you get into a habit of expressing yourself in a straightforward manner, like a loyal subject of our gracious Queen Victoria, and a member of the Church of England?" Towers laughed, as he generally does when he has fidgetted me into any of my impatient ways-one of my states, as I call them-and then he began, - "Tone, ma'am, Tone, is all you require!" He appealed to Trottle, who just then came in with the coal-scuttle, looking, in his nice black suit, like an amiable man putting on coals from motives of benevolence. Trottle (whom I always call my right hand) has been in my service two-and-thirty years. He entered my service, far away from England. He is the best of creatures, and the most respectable of men; but, opinionated. "What you want, ma'am," says Trottle, making up the fire in his quiet and skilful way, "is Tone." "Lard forgive you both!" says I, bursting out a-laughing; "I see you are in a conspiracy against me, so I suppose you must do what you like with me, and take me to London for a change."