They were all about her in a moment. Caleb, who had been dozing on the cake-box, in the first start, seized Tilly Slowboy by the hair, but immediately apologized.
“Mary!” exclaimed the carrier, for Dot’s real name was Mary, Dot being only a pet name of her husband’s. “Mary dear, are you ill? What is it? Tell me, dear.”
But at first she could not answer. She wept bitterly, and covered her face with her apron; then burst into a wild fit of laughter, and then started crying again. At length she let John lead her to the fire, where she sat down. The old man was standing there as before.
“I’m better, John,” she said. “I’m quite well. It was only a fancy, something coming before my eyes. It’s gone, quite gone now.”
“But why did she look at the old gentleman, as if addressing him?” thought John. “Was her mind wandering?”
“I’m glad it’s gone,” muttered Tackleton, turning the expressive eye around the room. “I wonder where it’s gone, and what it was. Humph, Caleb, come here! Who’s that man with the gray hair?”
“I don’t know, sir,” Caleb answered in a whisper. “Never saw him before in all my life. He’d make a beautiful figure for a nut-cracker; quite a new model.”
“Not ugly enough!” said Tackleton.
“Or a match-safe,” Caleb continued. “What a model! Unscrew his head to put the matches in. Let them fall down to his neck, and take out.”
“Not half ugly enough,” said Tackleton. “Nothing in him at all. Come! Bring that box! All right now, I hope, Mrs. Peerybingle?”