The words acted like magic. Gedge slipped back, drawing Bracy’s arm from where it lay, and he then carefully laid it down beside him.
“It’s all right, sir, now, sir; ain’t it, Mr Bracy?”
“Yes, yes,” said the latter faintly, and looking up at his visitor in a weary, dazed way.
“This fellow has not been assaulting you, has he?” cried Drummond.
“Me? ’Saulting him, sir?” cried Gedge. “Well, come now, I do like that!”
“Oh no; oh no,” sighed Bracy.
“It was like this here,” continued Gedge; “I was a-hanging about waiting to see if he wanted me to give him a drink or fetch him anything.”
Bracy’s lips moved, and an anxious expression came over his face; but he said nothing, only looked wildly from one to the other.
“Then all at once I hears him calling, and I went in. ‘Here, Gedge, my lad,’ he says—just like that, sir, all wild-like—‘take this here arm away; it’s trying to strangle me.’
“‘What! yer own arm, sir?’ I says, laughing. ‘That won’t do.’—‘Yes, it will,’ he says, just in that squeezy, buzzy way, sir; ‘I can’t bear it. Take it off, or it’ll choke me!’”