“The house?”
“I really don’t know particulars. They say it’s been dreadful. I’m sorry to have to say it, but I hope there’s no lives lost, and that you are insured.”
“Drive on!” shouted Pasco to the postilion. “Drive on’lose no time. There is a fire at my house.”
The horses whirled away, and Pasco no longer disguised his nervousness. It was natural that he should be uneasy.
“You needn’t trouble yourself,” said Mr. Squire. “If lives had been lost you would have heard, and if you are insured to full value, well”’
On reaching the summit of the hill whence Coombe was visible, a sickly scented smoke was wafted into the carriage windows.
“By George, I can smell it!” exclaimed the solicitor. “It is a sort of concentrated essence of burnt wool.”
“Then my stores are gone!” cried Pepperill. “And all the fleeces for which I have just borrowed two hundred pounds of you to pay’all lost. I’m a ruined man.”
“Not a bit,” answered the lawyer. “You are insured.”
The postilion needed no urging; he cracked his whip, and the horses flew down hill, the chaise rattled through the village, past the church and the inn, whence the host came out to see whether a distinguished guest was coming, and drew up at the entrance to the paddock before the Cellars.