“Oh, dear, no, sir! I shall attend upon you; but, the fact is, I’m in trouble.”
“Humph! And you want an advance upon your wages. How much?”
“No, sir,” said Jerry, irritably, as he drove the bristles of one brush among the bristles of the other; “it’s not that sort of trouble. It’s about someone.”
“Lady! Why, Brigley, you’re not thinking of getting married?”
“Oh, no, sir! it’s about—about a gent—I mean a man, sir. It’s him as you know, sir—Smithson.”
“Dick Smithson!” cried the lieutenant. “What’s the matter with him?”
“He ain’t been the same, sir, since the night of the ball. He has worried me a deal.”
“Yes, he seems a good deal pulled down, poor fellow! But is he ill again?”
“No, sir; he went out yesterday—had a pass—and—”
“And what? Don’t hesitate like that, man!”