"Good afternoon, Mr. Harry! Hullo, Andy!" said Chinks and the Bird. When they were past, the Bird nudged Chinks with his elbow and winked his eye.
"Yes, he's getting no end of a swell, isn't he?" said Chinks. "Hand-and-glove with Harry Belfield!"
"I suppose you don't see much of those chaps now?" Harry was asking Andy at the same moment. There was just a shadow of admonition in the question.
"I'm afraid I don't. Well, we're all at work. And when I do get a day off—"
"You don't need to spend it at the Lion!" laughed Harry. "As good drink and better company in other places!"
There were certainly good things to drink and eat at Halton, and Andy could not be blamed if he found the company at least as well to his liking. He had not been there since he was quite a small boy—in the days before Nancy Rock migrated from the house next the butcher's shop in High Street to preside over his home—but he had never forgotten the handsome dining-room with its two Vandykes, nor the glass of sherry which Mr. Belfield had once given him there. Mrs. Belfield received him with graciousness, Mr. Belfield with cordiality. Of course he was the first to arrive, being very fearful of unpunctuality. Even Harry was not down yet. Not being able, for obvious reasons, to ask after her guest's relations—her invariable way, when it was possible, of opening a conversation—Mrs. Belfield expressed her pleasure at seeing him back in Meriton.
"My husband thinks you're such a good companion for Harry," she added, showing that her pleasure was genuine, even if somewhat interested.
"Yes, Hayes," said Mr. Belfield. "See all you can of him; we shall be grateful. He wants just what a steady-going sensible fellow, as everybody says you are, can give him—a bit of ballast, eh?"
"Everybody" had been, in fact, Jack Rock, but—again for obvious reasons—the authority was not cited by name.
"You may be sure I shall give him as much of my company as he'll take, sir," said Andy, infinitely pleased, enormously complimented.