“Why, I have told you the story,” said Morny.
“No, you haven’t. You keep stopping short when you come to what interests me most.”
“Nonsense! You don’t want me to go on telling you about catching more fish and getting them fried day after day, and about taking them up to my father.”
“What do you know about it?” cried Rodd. “It’s just what I do want you to tell me. Did he like them and eat them, and did they do him good? Those are the best bits.”
“You are a droll of boy,” said Morny, laughing.
“I’m a what?” cried Rodd.
“Droll of boy—drôle de garçon. C’est juste, n’est-ce pas?”
“Oh, if you like,” cried Rodd merrily; “but if you don’t think those are the best parts of the story, which are?”
“Ah!” said Morny thoughtfully. “The part that I remember most is feeling that somehow things are not always so black as they look, that Dartmoor was not such a dreary desert, and that the fierce frowning guards were not so hard and unpleasant as they seemed. There were times after that when I was very happy there, for my father’s wound began to get better, and I found myself strong and well again. But after a time there was a new governor there, who behaved very harshly to the prisoners, and as we got well the great longing for freedom used to grow within us, and some of the men tried to escape. This made the governor more harsh and stern. We were kept more shut up—”
“And I suppose that made you long all the more to get free?”