“And this?”
“That?” repeated the stripling, pausing, with a hesitation between sulkiness and doubt; “that?—”
“Come, this is a little ungallant!” cried Katherine; “to keep three ladies dying with impatience to possess themselves of their finery, while you detain the boy, to ask the name of a tambouring-needle!”
“I should apologize for asking questions that are so easily answered; but perhaps he will find the next more difficult to solve,” returned Borroughcliffe, placing the subject of his inquiries in the palm of his hand, in such a manner as to conceal it from all but the boy and himself, “This has a name too; what is it?”
“That?—that—is sometimes called—white-line.”
“Perhaps you mean a white lie?”
“How, sir!” exclaimed the lad, a little fiercely, “a lie!”
“Only a white one,” returned the captain. “What do you call this. Miss Dunscombe?”
“We call it bobbin, sir, generally, in the north,” said the placid Alice.
“Ay, bobbin, or white-line; they are the same thing,” added the young trader.