“Was he hit?”
A shake of the head.
“Was the Frenchman wounded?”
“Here—flesh wound—nothing serious.”
“That's all right. I'll leave you now, to finish your lunch in quiet. You 'll find me on the Pincian when you stroll out.”
“Look here! Don't go! Wait a bit! I want you to tell me in one word,—can I get anything or not?”
The intense earnestness of his face as he spoke would have made any further tantalizing such a cruelty that Agincourt answered frankly, “Yes, old fellow, they 've made you a Boundary Commissioner; I forget where, but you're to have a thousand a year, and some allowances besides.”
“This is n't a joke? You 're telling me truth?” asked he, trembling all over with anxiety.
“On honor,” said Agincourt, giving his hand.
“You 're a trump, then; upon my conscience, you 're a trump. Here I am now, close upon eight-and-thirty,—I don't look it by five years, but I am,—and after sitting for four sessions in Parliament, not a man did I ever find would do me a hand's turn, but it 's to a brat of a boy I owe the only bit of good fortune of my whole life. That's what I call hard,—very hard.”