"Yes, that's Jim; I perceive that you are acquainted with the young scoundrel's name."
"He's not a young scoundrel. Frances told me he was a darling. She showed me his photograph; I could see for myself that he's very good-looking."
"You said Frances was lovely; I am therefore not surprised to hear that you think her brother's good-looking. My word! However, on a question of taste there is no disputing." He stood up; the brown paper parcel in his hands. "Shall I place this inside that private apartment of yours? And will you be so good as to make your toilet with all possible expedition? I should like to start from here well inside thirty minutes--if you could manage to be ready?"
"I'm very sorry to intrude; or to interfere with what seems to be a very nice little arrangement; but it isn't only a question of what the young lady can manage--what price me?"
This question came from a figure which all at once rose from a clump of furze which was at the back of Mr Frazer.
CHAPTER X
[WHAT THE CARAVAN LEFT BEHIND]
Swinging round in the direction from which the voice came, Mr Frazer stood still to stare. The girl, rising to her feet, stared also; with her pale cheeks a little paler, and her eyes wide open.
The speaker was one of those shambling, half-grown youths who are generally found attached to gipsy caravans, as hangers-on. That he had gipsy blood in his veins, his hair and eyes and skin suggested; but that he was as much Cockney as gipsy his tongue betrayed. With a ragged cloth cap on the back of his head; the remains of a black-and-white checked woollen scarf about his sinewy neck; a faded old red flannel shirt plainly visible under an unbuttoned sleeved waistcoat; his fingers thrust into the band of his trousers: he grinned first at the man, and then at the woman, in evident enjoyment of their something more than surprise. He showed no inclination to break the silence which followed his wholly unexpected, and undesired, appearance on the scene; from his point of view the joke was apparently too good a one to spoil. It was Mr Frazer who spoke next.
"Who are you?--and what business have you to be here?"