The red-haired boy cleared his throat. He was rather touched by his own simple eloquence.
Mr. Darling reflected on this with profound satisfaction for some moments. Then he broke out almost querulously, “Yes, but brast him!—where’s ’e gone?”
“Anyhow,” said Mr. Darling, “I ain’t going to tell ’er, not till the morning. I ain’t going to lose my night’s rest if I have lost my stepson. Nohow. Mr. Mergleson, I must say, I don’t think I ever ’ave tasted better beer. Never. It’s—it’s famous beer.”
He had some more....
On his way back through the moonlight to the gardens Mr. Darling was still unsettled as to the exact way of breaking things to his wife. He had come out from the house a little ruffled because of Mr. Mergleson’s opposition to a rather good idea of his that he should go about the house and “holler for ’im a bit. He’d know my voice, you see. Ladyship wouldn’t mind. Very likely ’sleep by now.” But the moonlight dispelled his irritation.
How was he to tell his wife? He tried various methods to the listening moon.
There was for example the off-hand newsy way. “You know tha’ boy yours?” Then a pause for the reply. Then, “’E’s toley dis’peared.”
Only there are difficulties about the word totally.
Or the distressed impersonal manner. “Dre’fle thing happen’d. Dre’fle thing. Tha’ poo’ lill’ chap, Artie—toley dis’peared.”
Totally again.