"You'll have no trouble about finding company," said mine host, with a benign smile. "As you say, Barney has been a good many times off. He hasn't kept the best of company. He's been too much with that Briggs."
"Yes," I assented, carelessly; "I have repeatedly warned him to let the fellow alone. Has he no occupation?"
"Briggs? he's a sort of extra hand for 'Squire Brookhouse; but, he plays more than he works," trifling with the leaves of his register, and then casting his eye slowly down the page before him. "Here's an odd thing, you might say," laughing, as he lifted his eye from the book, "I'm losing my most boisterous boarder and my quietest one at the same time."
"Indeed; who else is going?"
My entertainer cast a quick glance towards the occupant of the window, and lowered his voice as he replied:
"The gentleman in gray."
"In gray?" absently. "Oh! to be sure, a—a patent-right agent, is he not?"
Another glance toward the window, then lowering his voice an additional half tone, and favoring me with a knowing wink, he said:
"Have you heard anything concerning him?"