“Let me go with you,—may I?” said Alfred. “I like to see and hear everything I can.”
Mr. Mitchelson professing himself glad of his company, Alfred turned his horse’s head in search of the contractor.
While this important personage was musing and calculating, Mr. Mitchelson kept urging,—
“Time, you know, is everything. Anything to save time.”
Alfred modestly suggested that it would be worth trying the experiment of making the slaves as much like English labourers for the occasion as possible. Mitchelson laughed at the idea; but asked the contractor how long the repairs would take if the number of slaves he meant to employ were English labourers?
“From twelve to fifteen days, I should think.”
“And how long if they work like slaves in general?”
“Probably sixty days.”
“Somewhat under the time I fixed in my own mind. You know, Alfred, I said three months at a round guess.”
“I wish—I wish——” Alfred kept saying, half to himself.