"Oh no, thank you. I don't mind a little wet. Hark how the wind blows in the old chimney up there! It'll be an awkward night on the west coast, this. I wonder what it feels like to be driving right on the rocks at the Land's End, or some such place."
"Don't talk of such things in that cool way, Mr. Thomas. You make my blood run cold," said Mrs. Boxall.
"He doesn't mean it, you know, grannie," said Lucy meditating.
"But I do mean it. I should like to know how it feels," persisted Thomas—"with the very shrouds, as taut as steel bars, blowing out in the hiss of the nor'wester."
"Yes, I dare say!" returned the old lady, with some indignation. "You would like to know how it felt so long as your muddy boots was on my clean fender!"
Thomas did not know that the old lady had lost one son at sea, and had another the captain of a sailing-vessel, or he would not have spoken as he did. But he was always wanting to know how things felt. Had not his education rendered it impossible for him to see into the state of his own mind, he might, questioned as to what he considered the ideal of life, have replied, "A continuous succession of delicate and poetic sensations." Hence he had made many a frantic effort after religious sensations. But the necessity of these was now somewhat superseded by his growing attachment to Lucy, and the sensations consequent upon that.
Up to this moment, in his carriage and speech, he had been remarkably different from himself, as already shown in my history. For he was, or thought himself, somebody here; and there was a freedom and ease about his manner, amounting, in fact, to a slight though not disagreeable swagger, which presented him to far more advantage than he had in the presence of his father and mother, or even of Mr. Boxall and Mr. Stopper. But he never could bear any one to be displeased with him except he were angry himself. So when Mrs. Boxall spoke as she did, his countenance fell. He instantly removed his feet from the fender, glanced up at her face, saw that she was really indignant, and, missing the real reason of course, supposed that it was because he had been indiscreet in being disrespectful to a cherished article of housewifely. It was quite characteristic of Tom that he instantly pulled his handkerchief from his pocket, and began therewith to restore the brightness of the desecrated iron. This went at once to the old lady's heart. She snatched the handkerchief out of his hand.
"Come, come, Mr. Thomas. Don't ye mind an old woman like that. To think of using your handkerchief that way! And cambric too!"
Thomas looked up in surprise, and straightway recovered his behavior.
"I didn't think of your fender," he said.