“Do just ask where the theatre is,” said the boy, in a whisper, turning away his head.
Kenelm stopped the cob, made the inquiry, and was directed to take the next turning to the right. In a few minutes the compo portico of an ugly dilapidated building, dedicated to the Dramatic Muses, presented itself at the angle of a dreary, deserted lane. The walls were placarded with play-bills, in which the name of Compton stood forth as gigantic as capitals could make it. The boy drew a sigh. “Now,” said he, “let us look out for an inn near here,—the nearest.”
No inn, however, beyond the rank of a small and questionable looking public-house was apparent, until at a distance somewhat remote from the theatre, and in a quaint, old-fashioned, deserted square, a neat, newly whitewashed house displayed upon its frontispiece, in large black letters of funereal aspect, “Temperance Hotel.”
“Stop,” said the boy; “don’t you think that would suit us? it looks quiet.”
“Could not look more quiet if it were a tombstone,” replied Kenelm.
The boy put his hand upon the reins and stopped the cob. The cob was in that condition that the slightest touch sufficed to stop him, though he turned his head somewhat ruefully as if in doubt whether hay and corn would be within the regulations of a Temperance Hotel. Kenelm descended and entered the house. A tidy woman emerged from a sort of glass cupboard which constituted the bar, minus the comforting drinks associated with the beau ideal of a bar, but which displayed instead two large decanters of cold water with tumblers a discretion, and sundry plates of thin biscuits and sponge-cakes. This tidy woman politely inquired what was his “pleasure.”
“Pleasure,” answered Kenelm, with his usual gravity, “is not the word I should myself have chosen. But could you oblige my horse—I mean that horse—with a stall and a feed of oats, and that young gentleman and myself with a private room and a dinner?”
“Dinner!” echoed the hostess,—“dinner!”
“A thousand pardons, ma’am. But if the word ‘dinner’ shock you I retract it, and would say instead something to eat and drink.’”
“Drink! This is strictly a Temperance Hotel, sir.”