We shook, facing one another with gleaming eyes and teeth.
“Didn’t I tell you,” he gasped, “that he was a thread-paper of a man once?”
He went and clapped a hand on the mountain’s shoulder.
“Come, Johnny, no offence,” said he. “None knows better than her ladyship that your heart’s in the right place.”
I subdued myself by a vast effort, and rose, and went to conciliate the poor creature.
“Haven’t I reason to?” I said. “And—and I put my faith in you, sir; and—and faith moves mountains”—and I was near off again.
He shifted, and flushed faintly, and delivered himself once more.
“’Tis the wittles—have done it.”
“He means,” said George, “that he’s made up for lost time and opportunities, since his promotion.”
“Ay, ’twas the nerves,” went on the oracle—“kep’ me down—once. Shook, I did—hear thunder. Walk a mile round—avoid row. When the crows holloa’d—see funeral pass—turned blood water. ’Twas lack ballast—that was it.”