"Oh, Bardeleau! I know him. Crops look finely."
"Yes, very finely, sir," answered the workman.
"Going to the house soon?"
"Yes, sir, going in to dinner before long," answered the man.
"Well, my good man," said Leslie, "be good enough to give Mr. Bardeleau the regards of Mr. Thompson, International Hotel, an old friend of his, and to tell him that war has just broken out between England and the United States, and that the President has this morning issued a proclamation annexing Canada to the State of New York. Good morning."
Mischief of this character varied and enlivened the performances of that day and the next, Harding alternately enjoying and protesting against it. But on the third day there was a decided change in the programme. Running over the register at the desk, before breakfast on Friday morning, Leslie found the following four names, arrivals of the night before: "Richard Crawford—John Crawford—Miss Isabel Crawford—Miss Marion Hobart—New York City."
"Why, here are acquaintances—or at least one of them!" he called to Harding, who was at a little distance. He might have said more than one acquaintance, with propriety, for though he had met none of the Crawfords except Bell, he knew so much of them from Josephine Harris that he seemed to have known them for a twelvemonth.
"Who are they?" asked Harding, busy with a carriage-order.
"The Crawfords—and somebody else with them," answered Leslie. "You remember the young ladies on Broadway, the impudent scoundrel and the caning, a few days ago—one of them a Miss Crawford"—
"Yes, I remember," said Harding, with a little flush rising suddenly to his face. He also remembered, beyond a doubt, that he had been very much impressed by that young lady, and that had he dared, he would have called at her house before leaving the city. Here she was, brought accidentally into the same hotel with himself, and—. What else he thought may be left to the imagination. "Yes, I remember," he said. "And the other lady—Miss Harris, is she in the company?"