“Got to say to it?” replied Sinkins, calmly.
“Yes, sir, got to say to it, sir,” cried Thompson, with an irritating air of superiority that appeared to suggest that he had got the carpenter in a corner now, from which he did not mean to let him escape until he had answered the question put to him so sharply.
Sinkins seemed to feel that his rule was necessary once again, but the boxwood was allowed to slip back as its master shook his head, and said in a slow serious way,—
“I haven’t got anything to say to it, Mr Thompson, sir.”
“Oh, you haven’t.”
“No, sir,” replied the carpenter stolidly. “If I was to say a lot to it, I don’t see as it would make any difference one way or the other.”
“No, sir, I should think it wouldn’t,” cried Thompson; and just then Miss Mason, the brisk-looking, dark-eyed, ale-bearing Hebe of two-and-twenty, came in, looking as if she were wearing an altered silk dress that had once been the property of Glynne Day.
“Oh, you are here, Mr Thompson, are you?” she said with a voice full of acidity.
“Yes, ma’am, I am here,” said Thompson, sharply.
“Perhaps you’ll come up as soon as you’ve drunk your ale, Mr Sinkins,” said Miss Mason, sweetly. “I’ll show you which room.”