‘Hulloh Duck, how are you?’ he said quietly, as if nothing had happened. ‘I thought you were a garrotter.’
Jabez stood looking at him, the picture of blank amazement.
‘Mr. Egerton,’ he stammered, ‘I——’
But the ghost interrupted him curtly:
‘I’m in a hurry now. Tell Grigg and Limpet I’ll call on them to-morrow.’
And on went Mr. Egerton, leaving Jabez to go home through the pouring rain with a piece of information which astonished the little birthday party considerably, and brought Miss Georgina out of the coal-cellar long before the thunderstorm had subsided.
CHAPTER XVI.
LIMPET, JUNIOR, TRANSACTS SOME BUSINESS.
Messrs. Grigg & Limpet Were duly informed of Mr. Gurth Egerton’s mysterious resurrection, by their faithful clerk, and sat in state all the morning, ready to receive their adventurous and eccentric client.
Both Grigg and Limpet were anxious to have the mystery of his laziness in coming to life explained, and had been puzzling their brains to account for it. Yet when, shortly after noon, Mr. Gurth Egerton was announced as having entered the clerks’ office, there was no departure from the usual ceremony.
‘Say we are engaged, and show Mr. Egerton into room B,’ said Mr. Limpet.