"I thought you must. Why, you gave evidence, to be sure. Be dashed! now I come to mind, if you wasn' the first to wake the house an' say you heard a man hollerin' out down 'pon the mud."
"Iss, I was."
"An' saved his life, though you did get 'en two months in Bodmin Gaol by it. Up to the arm-pits he was, an' not five minutes to live, when we hauled 'en out, an' wonderin' what he could be doin' there, found he'd been stealin' our eggs. He inquired after you to-day."
"Did he?"
"Iss. 'How's Miss Marty?' says he. 'Agein' rapidly,' says I. The nerve that some folks have! Comes up to me as cool as my lord and holds out a hand. He've a-grown into a sort of commercial; stomach like a bow-window, with a watch-guard looped across. I'd a mind to say 'Eggs' to 'en, it so annoyed me."
"I hope you didn't."
"No. 'Twould have seemed like bearin' malice. 'Tis an old tale, after all, that feat of his."
"Nine an' thirty year, come seventeenth o' September next. Did he say any more?"
"Said the weather-glass was risin', but too fast to put faith in."
"I mean, did he ask any more about me?"