'Lord!' said Mrs. Mathews irrelevantly, subsiding into a chair, 'I thought you was dead. You never writ.'
'That,' said Mathews, 'was conseckens of a understanding clear and likewise to the point, atwixt me and Mas'r Dick. "Mum's the word," sez he. "Mum's the word," sez I. And that there was as it should be, no argifyin' provin' contrairiwise. But Milord he found me out, and sez as how he knows it all, and would I come home?—which, bein' free from horspital, I likewise does. Now, m' dear, if you will proceed with any nooz I would be much obliged to draw up a little forrader, as it were.'
'Did Milord tell you about Miss Elise?' said his wife, after much thought. 'She's gone and got herself engaged.'
'To who?'
'Captain Selwyn. Him as was visiting here when the war begun.'
'Now that there,' said Mathews, nodding his head slowly and admiringly, 'is nooz. That there is what a feller likes to hear from his old woman. You're a-doin' fine.'
'The wedding,' went on his wife, her eyes sparkling with the universal feminine excitement about such matters, 'is next week, and Wellington is bespoke for to pump the organ. Ain't that wonderful grand?'
'That,' said Mathews with great dignity, 'is werry gratifyin' to a parent, that is. Pump the organ at a weddin'! I hopes he won't go for to do nothing to give inconwenience to the parties concerned. Where is he, old girl?'
'Upstairs in bed, daddy, with the whooping-cough something horrid.'
'Wot a infant!' commented the groom proudly. 'I never see such a offspring for his age—never. Whoopin'-cough something horrid? Well, well!'