It occurred to Mr. Peters that a man of the other’s wealth and business connections might well have a troupe of these useful females. He particularised.
“I mean the young lady out in the garden there, to whom you were dictating just now. The young lady with the writing-pad on her knee.”
“What! What!” Mr. Bennett spluttered. “Do you know who that is?” he exclaimed.
“Oh, yes, indeed!” said Jno. Peters. “I have only met her once, when she came into our office to see Mr. Samuel, but her personality and appearance stamped themselves so forcibly on my mind, that I know I am not mistaken. I am sure it is my duty to tell you exactly what happened when I was left alone with her in the office. We had hardly exchanged a dozen words, Mr. Bennett, when—”—here Jno. Peters, modest to the core, turned vividly pink—“when she told me—she told me that I was the only man she loved!”
Mr. Bennett uttered a loud cry.
“Sweet spirits of nitre! What!”
“Those were her exact words.”
“Five!” ejaculated Mr. Bennett, in a strangled voice. “By the great horn spoon, number five!”
Mr. Peters could make nothing of this exclamation, and he was deterred from seeking light by the sudden action of his host, who, bounding from his seat with a vivacity of which one would not have believed him capable, charged to the French window and emitted a bellow.
“Wilhelmina!”