“It was the making of me, was that fire.”
“How long had you been insured before you were burnt out?”
“Well, now, that is the curious part of the story,” said the landlord; “hardly a week.”
“And how did your place catch fire?”
“There was a tramp. I refused to take him in, as he had no money. That was the best stroke of business I ever did in my life. He hid himself in a sort o’ lean-to there was over the pigs’ houses, joined on to the house, and in it was straw. I reckon he went to sleep there with his pipe alight, and he set fire to the place.”
“Was he burnt?”
“No; he got away all right; but the straw set fire to the rafters, and they ran into the wall. It was a poor old wall, with no mortar in it, and the rafters came in just under those of the upstairs chambers, so that when the roof of the linhay was afire, it set the house in a blaze too. That was how it all came about.”
“And a good job it was for you!”
“It was the making of me.”
Pasco was silent through the meal. He seemed hardly to taste what he was eating. He gulped down his food and drank copiously.