My professional work in the vicinity of Greenton left my evenings and occasionally an afternoon unoccupied; these intervals I purposed to employ in studying and classifying my fellow-boarder. It was necessary, as a preliminary step, to learn something of his previous history, and to this end I addressed myself to Mr. Sewell that same night.
“I do not want to seem inquisitive,” I said to the landlord, as he was fastening up the bar, which, by the way, was the salle à manger and general sitting-room. “I do not want to seem inquisitive, but your friend Mr. Jaffrey dropped a remark this morning at breakfast which—which was not altogether clear to me.”
“About Mehetabel?” asked Mr. Sewell uneasily.
“Yes.”
“Well, I wish he wouldn’t!”
“He was friendly enough in the course of conversation to hint to me that he had not married the young woman, and seemed to regret it.”
“No, he didn’t marry Mehetabel.”
“May I inquire why he didn’t marry Mehetabel?”
“Never asked her. Might have married the girl forty times. Old Elkin’s daughter over at K——, she’d have had him quick enough. Seven years off and on, he kept company with Mehetabel, and then she died.”
“And he never asked her?”