It was, as we had at once conjectured, our friend Mr Isaac Shifty, in soul, body, and buttons. In true Connecticut fashion, he stood a couple of minutes close to us without saying a word. It almost looked as if he took a delight in our difficulties, and was in no particular hurry to extricate us from them. For our part, we kept very much on our guard. The cross-grained scarecrow might likely enough have left us to our fate again, if we had said any thing that did not exactly chime in with his queer humour. Richards at last broke silence.
“Bad weather,” said he.
“Well, I don’t know. I shouldn’t say it was though, exactly,” returned the Yankee.
“You have not met the two women you were looking for, have you?”
“No. Guess they’ll have stopped at Florence, with cousin Kate.”
“You are not thinking of going there too, are you?” said Richards.
“No. I’m goin’ home. I thought you were at the ferry by this time.”
“Perhaps we should have been, if your roads were better, and the holes in them filled up with stones instead of walnut-trees,” returned Richards, laughing.
“Guess you ain’t inclined to go to the ferry to-day?”
“Inclined we are, but able we are not,” replied Richards; “and you will acknowledge, my friend, that is a pretty strong reason for not going.”