“Well,” said Mark musing, “I suppose we shall soon know. But we certainly don’t want them here.”
Chapter Twenty Eight.
A Discussion.
“A mussy me, Mr Mark, sir, as my old mother used to say. Ah, and she would say it again, poor old soul, if she were alive—bless her—and could see her pretty little curly-headed darling out here in savage Africa. Nice little curly-headed darling, arn’t I, Mr Mark, sir? ‘My beauty,’ she used to call me, when she had made me cry by jigging the comb through my hair, as would always tie itself up into knots like a nigger’s.”
“Why, it isn’t curly now, Buck.”
“Not a bit, sir; been cut too many times to keep it short, and all the curl got cut off, ha, ha, ha!” And the big, burly fellow burst into a boisterous laugh. “Bless her old heart! She never could have thought that I should grow into a six-footer weighing seventeen stun. Little woman she was—a pretty little woman too,” said Buck proudly. “Fancy her seeing me seventeen stun, and not a bit of fat about me! Ah, it’s ram, sir—rum. Rum as the name of our old village where we used to live down in Essex. Chignal Smealey. Well, sir,” continued the big driver, wiping his beaded forehead, “we have had a pretty good time of it, haven’t we? And I mean to say that we are regular ship-shape. What do you think of it, sir?”
“Oh, never mind what I think, Buck. I’ll tell you what father said to the doctor.”
“Ah, do, sir.”