"Yes, my lord."
"Then drive all you know. Put them at the hills at a gallop."
Fräulein pressed a packet of biscuits into the Bishop's hand. "He eat no breakfast," she said.
"Uncle Dick said the porch would sit down, and it has," said Regie, in an awe-struck voice, as the carriage swayed from side to side of the road. "Father knows a great deal, but sometimes I think Uncle Dick knows most of all. First gates and flying half-pennies, and now porches."
"Uncle Dick is staying in Southminster. Perhaps we shall see him."
"I should like to ask him about his finger, if it isn't a secret."
"I don't think it is. Now, what secret shall we make up on the way?" The Bishop put his head out of the window. "Drive faster," he said.
It was decided that the secret should be a Christmas-present for "Auntie Hester," to be bought in Southminster. The Bishop found that Regie's entire capital was sixpence. But Regie explained that he could spend a shilling, because he was always given sixpence by his father when he pulled a tooth out. "And I've one loose now," he said. "When I suck it it moves. It will be ready by Christmas."
There was a short silence. The horses' hoofs beat the muffled ground all together.
"Don't you find, Mr. Bishop," said Regie, tentatively, "that this riding so quick in carriages and talking secrets does make people very hungry?"