"No, not there," replied Butler, almost in a whisper; "alas, my kind dame, not there," he added, with a melancholy smile, as he held the hand of the hostess and shook his head; "my fortune has in no jot improved since I left you almost a year ago. I broke from you hastily then to resume my share in the war, and I have had nothing but hard blows ever since. The tide, Mistress Dimock, sets sadly against us."
"Never let your heart fail you," exclaimed the landlady; "it isn't in the nature of things for the luck to be for ever on the shady side. Besides, take the good and bad together, you have not been so hardly dealt by, Captain Butler."
"Major Butler, madam, of the second Carolina continental reg'lar infantry," interrupted Robinson, who had stood by all this time unnoticed, "Major Butler; the captain has been promoted, by occasion of the wiping out of a few friends from the upper side of the adjutant's roll, in the scrimmage of Fort Moultrie. He is what we call, in common parley, brevetted."
This annunciation was made by the sergeant with due solemnity, accompanied by an attempt at a bow, which was abundantly stiff and ungraceful.
"My friend Sergeant Robinson," said Butler; "I commend him, Mistress Dimock, to your especial favor, both for a trusty comrade, and a most satisfactory and sufficient trencher man."
"You are welcome and free to the best that's in the house, sergeant," said the landlady, courtesying; "and I wish, for your sake, it was as good as your appetite, which ought to be of the best. Mr. Arthur Butler's word is all in all under this roof; and, whether he be captain or major, I promise you, makes no difference with me. Bless me! when I first saw you, major, you was only an ensign; then, whisk and away! and back you come a pretty lieutenant, about my house: and then a captain, forsooth! and now, on the track of that, a major. It is up-up-up-the ladder, till you will come, one of these days, to be a general; and too proud, I misdoubt, to look at such a little old woman as me! hegh, hegh, hegh! a pinch of snuff, Mr. Arthur." And here the good dame prolonged her phthisicky laugh for some moments, as she presented a box of Scotch snuff to her guest. "But I'll engage promotion never yet made the appetite of a travelling man smaller than before; so, gentlemen, you will excuse me while I look after your supper."
"The sooner the better, ma'am," said Robinson; "your night air is a sort of a whetstone to the stomach; but first, ma'am, I would be obligated to you, if you would let me see the ostler."
"Hut, tut! and have I been drivelling here all this time," exclaimed the dame, "without once spending a thought upon your cattle! Tony, Tony, To-ny, I say," almost shrieked the hostess, as she retreated along the passage towards the region of the kitchen, and then back again to the front door. "Are you asleep? Look to the gentlemen's horses; lead them to the stable, and don't spare to rub them down; and give them as much as they can eat. Where are you, old man?"
"What's the use of all this fuss, Missus Dimck? Arn't I here on the spot, with the cretur's in my hand?" grumbled out an old, stunted negro, who answered to the appellation of ostler; "Arn't I getting the baggage off, as fast as I can onbuckle the straps?—I don't want nobody to tell me when I ought to step out. If a hos could talk, he ain't got nothing new to say to me. Get out, you varmints," he shouted, with a sudden vivacity of utterance, at three or four dogs that were barking around him; "Consarn you! What you making such a conbobberation about? You all throat when you see gentmen coming to the house; better wait tell you see a thief; bound, you silent enough then, with your tail twixt your legs! Blossom, ya sacy slut, keep quiet, I tell you!"
In the course of this din and objurgation, the old negro succeeded in disburdening the horses of their furniture, and was about to lead them to the stable, when Robinson came to give him some directions.