Master Ambrose gave a deep sigh and leant back wearily in his chair, and for a few minutes they sat in silence.
Drearily and hopelessly Master Ambrose's mind wandered over the events of the day and finally settled, as is the way with a tired mind, on the least important—the red juice he had noticed oozing out of the coffin, when they had been checked at the west gate by the funeral procession.
"Do the dead bleed, Leer?" he said suddenly.
Endymion Leer sprang from his chair as if he had been shot. First he turned white, then he turned crimson.
"What the ... what the ..." he stuttered, "what do you mean by that question, Master Ambrose?"
He was evidently in the grip of some violent emotion.
"Busty Bridget!" exclaimed Master Ambrose, testily, "what, by the Harvest of Souls, has taken you now, Leer? It may have been a silly question, but it was quite a harmless one. We were stopped by a funeral this afternoon at the west gate, and I thought I saw a red liquid oozing from the coffin. But, by the White Ladies of the Fields, I've seen so many queer things today that I've ceased to trust my own eyes."
These words completely restored Endymion Leer's good humour. He flung back his head and laughed till the tears rolled down his cheeks.
"Why, Master Ambrose," he gurgled, "it was such a grisly question that it gave me quite a turn. Owing to the deplorable ignorance of this country I'm used to my patients asking me rather queer things ... but that beats anything I've yet heard. 'Do the dead bleed? Do pigs fly?' Ha, ha, ha, ha!"
Then, seeing that Master Ambrose was beginning to look stiff and offended, he controlled his mirth, and added, "Well, well, a man as sorely tried as you have been today, Master Ambrose, is to be excused if he has hallucinations ... it is wonderful what queer things we imagine we see when we are unhinged by strong emotion. And now I must be going. Birth and death, Master Ambrose, they wait for no man—not even for Senators. So I must be off and help the little Ludites into the world, and the old ones out of it. And in the meantime don't give up hope. At any moment one of Mumchance's good Yeomen may come galloping up with the little lady at his saddle-bow. And then—even if she should have eaten what you fear she has—I shall be much surprised if a Honeysuckle isn't able with time and care to throw off all effects of that foul fodder and grow up into as sensible a woman—as her mother."