'She's a-dying, I tell you, Mr. Tudor,' continued the landlady, 'and if she do die, be sure of this, I won't be slow to tell the truth about it. I'm the only friend she's got, and I'm not going to see her put upon. So just tell me this in two words—what is it you're a-going to do?' And then Mrs. Davis replaced her kerchief in the basket, stood boldly erect in the middle of the passage, waiting for Charley's answer.
Just at this moment Mr. Snape again appeared in the passage, going towards Mr. Oldeschole's room. The pernicious old man! He hated Charley Tudor; and, to tell the truth, there was no love lost between them. Charley, afflicted and out of spirits as he was at the moment, could not resist the opportunity of being impertinent to his old foe: 'I'm afraid you'll make yourself very tired, Mr. Snape, if you walk about so much,' said he. Mr. Snape merely looked at him, and then hard at Mrs. Davis, and passed on to Mr. Oldeschole's room.
'Well, Mr. Tudor, will you be so good as to tell me what it is you're going to do about this poor girl?'
'My goodness, Mrs. Davis, you know how I am situated—how can you expect me to give an answer to such a question in such a place as this? I'll come to the 'Cat and Whistle' on Tuesday.'
'Gammon!' said the eloquent lady. 'You know you means gammon.'
Charley, perhaps, did mean gammon; but he protested that he had never been more truthfully in earnest in his life. Mr. Oldeschole's door opened, and Mrs. Davis perceiving it, whipped out her handkerchief in haste, and again began wiping her eyes, not without audible sobs. 'Confound the woman!' said Charley to himself; 'what on earth shall I do with her?'
Mr. Oldeschole's door opened, and out of it came Mr. Oldeschole, and Mr. Snape following him. What means the clerk had used to bring forth the Secretary need not now be inquired. Forth they both came, and passed along the passage, brushing close by Charley and Mrs. Davis; Mr. Oldeschole, when he saw that one of the clerks was talking to a woman who apparently was crying, looked very intently on the ground, and passed by with a quick step; Mr. Snape looked as intently at the woman, and passed very slowly. Each acted according to his lights.
'I don't mean gammon at all, Mrs. Davis—indeed, I don't—I'll be there on Tuesday night certainly, if not sooner—I will indeed—I shall be in a desperate scrape if they see me here talking to you any longer; there is a rule against women being in the office at all.'
'And there's a rule against the clerks marrying, I suppose,' said Mrs. Davis.
The colloquy ended in Charley promising to spend the Saturday evening at the 'Cat and Whistle,' with the view of then and there settling what he meant to do about 'that there girl'; nothing short of such an undertaking on his part would induce Mrs. Davis to budge. Had she known her advantage she might have made even better terms. He would almost rather have given her a written promise to marry her barmaid, than have suffered her to remain there till Mr. Oldeschole should return and see her there again. So Mrs. Davis, with her basket and pocket-handkerchief, went her way about her marketing, and Charley, as he returned to his room, gave the strictest injunctions to the messenger that not, on any ground or excuse whatever, was any woman to be again allowed to see him at the office.