Claude did his best to digest such details in this information as were new to him while he nerved himself to say, "Is Miss Fay a-about?"
Jim nodded toward the blank windows of the house. "Moved. Better take a fern-tree, Claude. Won't get a bargain like this, not if every florist in the town goes bankrupt. This one's a peach, and yet you'll call it a scream compared to the one I've got inside. Bring it out so as you can get a squint at it. Can't wait, can't you? Well, so long! Got to finish my job. Back, Maud, back! Any time you do want a fern-tree, Claude—"
Claude was obliged to speak peremptorily in order to detain him. "I want to know where the Fays have moved to."
"To town," was the ready answer. "Well, so long! If I don't get on with my job—"
"What part of town?"
Jim turned at the hothouse door. "Oh, a very nice part."
"But that's not telling me."
"No," the young Irishman threw back, with his peculiar smile, "and if you take my advice you won't ask anybody else. If old man Fay was to see you within a mile of the place—"
Claude decided to be confidential. "Old man Fay has no reason to be afraid any longer, Jim—not as far as I'm concerned."
"Oh, it isn't as far as you're concerned; it's as far as he is. The boot's on that foot now."