“I don’t believe you!” said West sharply. “You couldn’t; they all made as much fuss over you as they did over me, from the chief downward!”
“Well, I suppose they did; but I began to have the horrors once!”
“Horrors?”
“Yes; knowing as I did that they must be short of food, I began to think that they were welcoming us so warmly because we were something good to eat, and all the feasting was the beginning of fattening us up.”
“Of course you did!” said West drily.
“I say though,” continued Ingleborough; “if it is not a state secret, what was it the chief said to you when he took you aside?”
“Oh, it’s no secret from you!” replied West.
“Let’s have it then!”
“Well, first of all, it was a lot of flattery.”
“Flattery?”