“Nothing particularly so,” said Varley, rolling a cigarette and lighting it with the last of his letters, an epistle written in the sentimental woman’s hand known as “Italian.”
“Ah!” Taffy drew a long breath of disappointment. “Nothing—nothing from Ralda, I s’pose?” he added in an off-hand way.
“No,” said Varley.
Taffy, while elaborately filling and lighting his pipe, stole a glance at the clear-cut, impassive face.
“Nothin’ this mail,” he said, as if it were rather satisfactory than otherwise. “Of course not. ’Tain’t to be supposed that Ralda ain’t got nothing else to do than to sit on a cheer writing letters to Three Star, as if she were a blamed clerk in a store, is it?”
Varley nodded.
“An’ yet, somehow,” said Taffy, under his breath, “I shouldn’t a-been sorry if there’d been a line or two this post, so as I could have got the bulge on Ed-er-ward. It ’ud a-shown him that Ralda ain’t so mean as to forget old friends, as he and some other mutton-heads may suppose.”
Varley nodded again.
“Make your mind easy, Taff,” he said. “Esmeralda hasn’t forgotten us; but just at present she mayn’t have much time for letter-writing; young ladies who are just married don’t find time hang on their hands much.”