"So I was," said Cleve, with an uneasy glance at Tom Sedley; "I knew I had heard something of it."
"Oh, yes; and they say that the old man was both mad and in debt."
"What a combination!" said Cleve.
"Yes, I assure you, and a Jew came down with twenty or thirty bailiffs—I'm only telling you what Mr. Apjohn heard, and the people here tell us—and a mad doctor, and people with strait waistcoats, and they surrounded Malory; but he was gone!—not a human being knew where—and that handsome girl, wasn't she quite bee-au-tiful?"
"Oh, what everyone says, you know, must be true," said Cleve.
"What do you say?" she urged upon Tom Sedley.
"Oh, I say ditto to everyone, of course."
"Well, I should think so, for you know you are quite desperately in love with her," said Miss Charity.
"I? Why, I really never spoke to her in all my life. Now, if you had said Cleve Verney."
"Oh, yes! If you had named me. But, by Jove! there they go. Do you see? My uncle and the mayor, and all the lesser people, trooping away to the town-hall. Good-bye! I haven't another moment. You'll be here, I hope, when we get out; do, pray. I have not a moment."