"Your carpet-bag. I presume, Sir. It will be quite safe here."
"It is not a carpet-bag," replied Cornelius, unwrapping me, and depositing me in a small ill-lit back parlour, with a grim landlady looking on.
"Your carpet-bag will be quite safe here," she resumed.
"I have none." She looked aghast. A little girl, and no carpet-bag!
"Yours, Sir, I presume?" she steadily observed.
"Mine!" echoed Cornelius, reddening, "no."
"Your sister, I presume, Sir?" persisted the landlady.
"She is no relative," he shortly answered; then, without heeding her, he felt my forehead, took my hand, said both were burning; looked at his watch, pondered, and finally startled the landlady—who had remained in the room taciturn and suspicious—with the abrupt query—
"Is there a medical man about here, Ma'am?"
"There is Mr. Wood."