He flung the shutters wide as he spoke, and the light streamed through two windows upon a great heap of blue cotton material, apparently enveloped in a network of fine ropes. Here and there lay other ropes neatly coiled, and close beside the blue heap was what looked like a large round hamper without a cover.
‘Waal,’ demanded Ephraim anxiously, after a somewhat protracted pause, during which Lucius glanced vacantly around the workshop, ‘what d’ ye think of her? I ’lowed I’d try and fix her up fer ye, seein’ ye war so sot.’
‘For me?’ echoed Lucius. ‘What is for me? I don’t see anything.’
‘Don’t see nuthin’, don’t ye?’ chuckled Ephraim. ‘I reckon ye see without onderstandin’. What d’ ye ’magine this is?’
He took up an armful of the blue fabric as he spoke and let it fall again in a heap.
‘I’m sure I don’t know,’ answered Lucius.
‘Co’se ye don’t; co’se ye don’t,’ said Ephraim, rubbing his hands together, and grinning delightedly. ‘Ye never see nuthin’ like her before, I bet.’
‘I have not,’ returned Lucius, now thoroughly awake, and examining everything with great curiosity. ‘What a queer-looking——Oh! why, Grizzly, if I don’t believe it’s a balloon!’
Ephraim sprang off the ground and twirled round in the air for joy. ‘Thet’s it,’ he cried. ‘Thet’s it! By time! ef ye ain’t cute. Thet’s jest what it is.’
‘But—but—I don’t understand,’ said Lucius, fingering the network. ‘Where did you get it?’