“And are you satisfied? Can you get on?”
“Satisfied ain’t the word for it. I was never meant to go shouldering arms and making two legs of a long centipede, and crawling about. It’s like getting back into real happiness. Waited table last night for the fust time. Didn’t you see me?”
“I? No.”
“I see you tootling away there on your floot, ’eavenly, but I couldn’t catch your eye. ’Sides, I was strange there, and had to mind what I was about, ’tending to my master. It was a real treat!”
“And so you think you’ll get on with him?”
“Get on with him! Why, I can do anything I like with him already! My word! they call red herrings sogers, and sogers red herrings, and he is a soft-roed un, and no mistake.”
“Lieutenant Lacey is a thorough gentleman, Jerry,” cried Dick, warmly.
“Every inch of him, Dick Smithson—mind, I’m a calling you that, Dick, but it’s meant respectful—a thorough gent, every inch of him, and there’s a good lot on him, too; but he is a bit slack-baked, you know. Why, if I liked, I could a’most gammon him into anything.”
“I trust you will prove as good a servant to him as you were to—”
“Me,” Dick was going to say, but he checked himself.