“All but Cadotte and his wife, madam; they have not gone.”
“What! you don’t say so? Cadotte has not gone?”
“No; they are living together with the girl’s father. Rankin has left him, without anything but his wife, to get home to his own country in the best way he can.”
“Well, there’s a brute for you; is’nt he—that Rankin? I always hated his looks, d’ye see. Not gone, ha? What is he to do here? Will he stay in London? Can’t Mr. Catlin do something for him? He’d be just a good hand now, to help you here, Daniel—to explain: you can’t always be here—there should be two of you. He comes here occasionally?”
“Oh, yes, he’s here every day.”
“Well, look ye, Daniel, I’ll call again and see Mr. Catlin about it. Something should be done. Mr. Catlin is a good fellow I know. I want a long talk with him; he shall know my whole mind on this affair. I can’t stay now—I must go; but what a pity—ha, Daniel! Good day.”
“Good day.”
She was very near discovering me as she turned round and passed my door; but Daniel smiled after she had gone out, and said he was quite sure she had not seen me, as he had kept her conversation directed to him, so that she should not turn her face round suddenly on me.
I was sorry that I had overheard this dialogue; but, as it had fallen thus into my possession, I resolved to make the most prudent use of it, believing it to contain the sum total of all she wished to say in her “long talk” with me; and I directed Daniel, when she should call to see me, to announce me “out of town,” and himself to engross all that she had to say, saving me from entering again upon an unpleasant subject, which I considered now at an end.
Thus continued my labours and Daniel’s, each one in his department, for three months or more after the Indians had left, by which time my large work was ready for publication (like the first one, “to be published by the Author, at the Egyptian Hall, price five guineas in printed tints, and eight guineas coloured), with a subscription-list headed by the illustrious names of—