“What a very fatiguing day this has been; haven't you found it so?”
“No, I can't say I have,” was the reply; “I daresay it was warm travelling: I'm afraid, in that case, Dr. Mildman will not have a very pleasant journey—he's gone to town to-day.”
“Ah, so that short, stout young gentleman” (the first two adjectives he pronounced very slowly and distinctly) “told me.”
“Mr. Coleman,” insinuated Mrs. Mildman.
“Pleasant that,” whispered Coleman to me.
“Take care,” replied I, “he will hear you.”
“I'm afraid,” continued Oaklands, “the old gentleman will be quite knocked up. I wonder he does not make two days' journey of it.”
“Dr. Mildman is not so very old,” observed Mrs. Mildman, in rather an annoyed tone of voice.
"I really beg pardon, I scarcely know why I said it,” replied Oaklands, “only I somehow fancied all tutors were between sixty and seventy—very absurd of me. My father sent all kind of civil messages to the o—— to Dr. Mildman, only it is so much trouble to remember that sort of thing.”
At this point the conversation was interrupted by the announcement of dinner. Oaklands (from whom I could not withdraw my eyes, so unlike anything I had ever met with before was he) was evidently preparing to hand Mrs. Mildman down to dinner, as soon as he could summon sufficient energy to move, but, perceiving Cumberland approach her for that purpose, he appeared to recollect himself, smiled slightly as if at what he had been about to do, and, taking me by the arm, said:—