“Business must be attended to,” responded Mr. Jiffin, quite lost in the contemplation of Afy’s numerous attractions, unusually conspicuous as they were. “Had I known that you were abroad, Miss Hallijohn, and enjoying a holiday, perhaps I might have done it, too, in the hope of coming across you somewhere or other.”
His words were bona fide as his admiration. Afy saw that, so she could afford to treat him rather de haut en bas. “And he’s as simple as a calf,” thought she.
“The greatest pleasure I have in life, Miss Hallijohn, is to see you go by the shop window,” continued Mr. Jiffin. “I’m sure it’s like as if the sun itself passed.”
“Dear me!” bridled Afy, with a simper, “I don’t know any good that can do you. You might have seen me go by an hour or two ago—if you had possessed eyes. I was on my way to Miss Carlyle’s,” she continued, with the air of one who proclaims the fact of a morning call upon a duchess.
“Where could my eyes have been?” exclaimed Mr. Jiffin, in an agony of regret. “In some of those precious butter-tubs, I shouldn’t wonder! We have had a bad lot in, Miss Hallijohn, and I am going to return them!”
“Oh,” said Afy, conspicuously resenting the remark. “I don’t know anything about that sort of thing. Butter-tubs are beneath me.”
“Of course, of course, Miss Hallijohn,” deprecated poor Jiffin. “They are very profitable, though, to those who understand the trade.”
“What is all that shouting?” cried Afy, alluding to a tremendous noise in the distance, which had continued for some little time.
“It’s the voters cheering Mr. Carlyle. I suppose you know that he’s elected, Miss Hallijohn?”
“No, I didn’t.”