“And where does she come from now?” asked Ripton, with the friendly cheerfulness of a baffled counsellor.
“Comes from the country, sir.”
“A friend of the family, I suppose? a relation?”
Ripton left this insinuating query to be answered by a look. Tom’s face was a dead blank.
“Ah!” Ripton took a breath, and eyed the mask opposite him. “Why, you’re quite a scholar, Tom! Mr. Richard is well. All right at home?”
“Come to town this mornin’ with his uncle,” said Tom. “All well, thank ye, sir.”
“Ha!” cried Ripton, more than ever puzzled, “now I see. You all came to town to-day, and these are your boxes outside. So, so! But Mr. Richard writes for me to get lodgings for a lady. There must be some mistake—he wrote in a hurry. He wants lodgings for you all—eh?”
“’M sure I d’n know what he wants,” said Tom. “You’d better go by the letter, sir.”
Ripton re-consulted that document. “‘Lodgings for a lady, and then come along with Tom. Not a word to a soul.’ I say! that looks like—but he never cared for them. You don’t mean to say, Tom, he’s been running away with anybody?”
Tom fell back upon his first reply: “Better wait till ye see Mr. Richard, sir,” and Ripton exclaimed: “Hanged if you ain’t the tightest witness I ever saw! I shouldn’t like to have you in a box. Some of you country fellows beat any number of cockneys. You do!”