“I don’t mean to. How many times have you been to look for it, Magg?”
“How many times? I didn’t count. Every morn when I come to work have I gone down on my chestie in that there loft, watching o’ them rat-holes.”
“Yes, and you’ve never caught him. Four shillings did I pay you for that ferret—”
“And a shillin’ more to pay,” said Magglin, grinning. “And only once have I seen his nasty ugly little pink nose since, when he poked it out of a hole and slipped back again.
“But then see how he must have kept down the rats,” said the man.
“Bother the rats. I want my ferret.” Mercer turned sharply round to me.
“I say,” he whispered, “he’s a blackguard and a cheat. We wanted to practise. Let’s both pitch into him.”
I naturally enough laughed at the idea, and, looking round at the under gardener, I saw that he was watching us with his rat-like eyes.
“I say,” he whispered, with an accompaniment of nods and winks, “I was lying wait for you two.”
“We’re not rabbits, Magg,” I said.