“Sit down, sergeant,” he repeats as he comes to his table, which is set on one side of the fire, and takes his easy-chair. “Cold and raw this morning, cold and raw!” Mr. Tulkinghorn warms before the bars, alternately, the palms and knuckles of his hands and looks (from behind that blind which is always down) at the trio sitting in a little semicircle before him.
“Now, I can feel what I am about” (as perhaps he can in two senses), “Mr. Smallweed.” The old gentleman is newly shaken up by Judy to bear his part in the conversation. “You have brought our good friend the sergeant, I see.”
“Yes, sir,” returns Mr. Smallweed, very servile to the lawyer’s wealth and influence.
“And what does the sergeant say about this business?”
“Mr. George,” says Grandfather Smallweed with a tremulous wave of his shrivelled hand, “this is the gentleman, sir.”
Mr. George salutes the gentleman but otherwise sits bolt upright and profoundly silent—very forward in his chair, as if the full complement of regulation appendages for a field-day hung about him.
Mr. Tulkinghorn proceeds, “Well, George—I believe your name is George?”
“It is so, Sir.”
“What do you say, George?”
“I ask your pardon, sir,” returns the trooper, “but I should wish to know what YOU say?”