"I'll get it all out of him," quoth Roland, who had not lost in the smallest degree his propensity to indulge in desultory gossip.
"Don't ask him in the office," advised Jenner. "Brown would stop you at the first word. He never lets a syllable be dropped upon the subject. I asked him one day what it was to him, and he answered that it was not seemly to allude to the affair in the house, as Mr. Ollivera had been a connection of it. My fancy is that Brown must have known something of it at the time, and does not like it mentioned on his own score," confidentially added little Jenner, who was of a shrewd turn. "I saw him change colour once over it."
"Who is Brown?" questioned Roland.
"That's more than I can say," was the reply. "He's an uncommonly efficient clerk; but, once out of the office, he keeps himself to himself, and makes friends with none of us. Here we are, sir."
The eating-house, however unsuitable it might have been to one holding his own as the nephew of an English baronet, to say nothing of an Irish peer, was welcome as sun in harvest to hungry Roland. He ordered a magnificent dinner, off-hand: three plates of meat each, three of tart; vegetables, bread and beer ad libitum: paid for the whole, changing his five-pound note, and gave a shilling to the man who waited on them. Little Jenner went out with his face shining.
"We must make the best of our way back, Mr. Yorke. Time's up."
"Oh, is it, though," cried Roland. "I'm not going back yet. I shall take a turn round to see Mrs. Jenkins; there are five hundred things I want to ask her."
One can only be civil to a man who has just treated one to a good dinner, and Jenner did not like to tell Roland pointblank that he had better not go anywhere but to the office.
"They are awfully strict about time in our place," cried he; "and we are busy just now. I must make haste back, sir."
"All right," said easy Roland. "Say I am coming."