“But I did see her on her pegs,” said Will, “at ‘The Black Sheep’!”
“Then why did you goo and carry that little old box?” inquired Caleb.
“She wasn’t in the cart then—how was I to guess she was the Carrier?” he answered crossly.
“But you could ha’ ast for the Bradmarsh carrier.”
“The coach was late,” he snapped.
“But Jinny hadn’t started yet,” persisted Caleb. “Bein’ as you seen her there.”
“Legends, my boy, legends.” Tony Flip’s euphemism for lies rang in Will’s brain. But legends, he was finding, are not easy to sustain. One lie breeds many, and he was sorry now he had allowed himself to be made a champion weight-lifter. “I thought being so late ’twas no use asking for the Carrier—’twas you I expected,” he said, turning the war back into the enemy’s country.
But they had now lumbered up with the box to the twin doors, and the task of dumping down the subject of discussion in a convenient place stayed the cross-examination.
The feast for the Prodigal Son had been laid in the parlour, and the scent of the fried sausages came appetizingly on the evening air, more poetic than any of Nature’s competing odours.
“Why, there’s my letter!” cried Will at the parlour door, beholding it on the mantelpiece. “You might have let me know you couldn’t meet me.”