“Yes?”
“It wouldn’t go, so I give a knock. ‘Who’s there?’ says she. ‘No one,’ says I; ‘it’s only hot wather I’m bringin’ you,’ for you see, sir, the ould missis, her ladyship, was in the next room, and she’s not as deaf as she looks, and it’s afraid I was, every minit, her door’d open, and she and her ear-trumpet come out in the passidge. ‘I have hot wather,’ says she. ‘Niver mind,’ says I, ‘this is bether. Open the door, for the love of God, for I can’t get it under the door, unless I rowl it up and shove it through the keyhole.’ Wid that she opens the door a crack and shoves her head out. ‘Who’s it from?’ she says. ‘I don’t know,’ says I; ‘it’s just a lether I found on the stairs I thought might belong to you.’ ‘Thanks,’ says she, ‘it does,’ and wid that she shut the door, and I left her.”
“Well, see here, Patsy!”
“Yes, sir?”
“I’m going to marry Miss Lestrange.”
“Faith, and I guessed that,” said Patsy; “and it’s I that’d be joyful to dance at your weddin’, sir.”
“There won’t be any dancing in the business,” said Mr Fanshawe grimly. And here, strangely enough, he was perfectly wrong, albeit the dancing was to be of a more than fantastic character. “You know Mr Boxall, Patsy?”
“The Mimber of Parlymint?”
“Yes. Well, he wants to marry Miss Lestrange; and the worst, of it is, Patsy, that my uncle, General Grampound, wants him to marry her, too.”
Patsy chuckled.