"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 eighteen-pence. 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?"
"Wife," returned John.