“That will do,” said Mr Hallett. And together we climbed up, and lay down, twelve or fifteen feet above the road, on the top of the sweet-scented trusses of hay; the carter cracked his whip, and away we went jolting over the road, with the stars above us, and my couch seeming delicious to my weary limbs, as the scent seemed to bring up my sleeping place by the hay-rick, when I ran away from Rowford and my slavery at Mr Blakeford’s house.
“That’s one of the peculiarities of the true-born Briton, Tony,” said Mr Hallett, after a pause.
“What is, sir?”
“The love and reverence for beer. If I had offered that man sixpence or a shilling to give us a ride, he would have laughed me to scorn. Two pints of beer, you see, carry us right to town, and another pint would have acted like a return ticket to bring us back.”
“To bring us back?” I said in drowsy accents; and, trusting to my companion to save me from a fall, I dropped into a heavy dreamless sleep, from which I was aroused by Mr Hallett, who shook my arm and told me that we were once more in town.
Chapter Twenty Two.
William Revitts is Angry.
Mr Hallett saw me right to the door of my lodgings before he left me, shaking hands warmly as he said “Good-night,” and altered it to “Good-morning.”