His garb was very quaint and odd—a long, long way behind the time. Its hue was brown, all over. In his hand he held a great brown club or walking-stick; and striking this upon the floor, it fell asunder, and became a chair. On which he sat down, quite composedly.
"There!" said the Carrier, turning to his wife. "That's the way I found him, sitting by the roadside! upright as a milestone. And almost as deaf."
"Sitting in the open air, John!"
"In the open air," replied the Carrier, "just at dusk. 'Carriage Paid,' he said; and gave me eighteenpence. Then he got in. And there he is."
"He's going, John, I think!"
Not at all. He was only going to speak.
"If you please, I was to be left till called for," said the Stranger, mildly. "Don't mind me."
With that, he took a pair of spectacles from one of his large pockets, and a book from another; and leisurely began to read. Making no more of Boxer than if he had been a house lamb!
The Carrier and his wife exchanged a look of perplexity. The Stranger raised his head; and glancing from the latter to the former, said:
"Your daughter, my good friend?"