“A little,” she said.
“You've written to the farm? O' course you have!”
“Oh! uncle, wait,” moaned Dahlia.
“But, ha' you been sick, and not written home?”
“Wait; please, wait,” she entreated him.
“I'll wait,” said Anthony; “but that's no improvement to queerness; and 'queer''s your motto. Now we cross London Bridge. There's the Tower that lived in times when no man was safe of keeping his own money, 'cause of grasping kings—all claws and crown. I'm Republican as far as 'none o' them'—goes. There's the ships. The sun rises behind 'em, and sets afore 'em, and you may fancy, if you like, there's always gold in their rigging. Gals o' your sort think I say, come! tell me, if you are a lady?”
“No, uncle, no!” Dahlia cried, and then drawing in her breath, added: “not to you.”
“Last time I crossed this bridge with a young woman hanging on my arm, it was your sister; they say she called on you, and you wouldn't see her; and a gal so good and a gal so true ain't to be got for a sister every day in the year! What are you pulling me for?”
Dahlia said nothing, but clung to him with a drooping head, and so they hurried along, until Anthony stopped in front of a shop displaying cups and muffins at the window, and leprous-looking strips of bacon, and sausages that had angled for appetites till they had become pallid sodden things, like washed-out bait.
Into this shop he led her, and they took possession of a compartment, and ordered tea and muffins.