Paul Ruttledge. [Touching rabbit.] It's warm still, however. But the day is hot. Never mind; you are quite welcome to it. I daresay you will have a cheery meal of it by the roadside; my dinners are often tiresome enough. I often wish I could change—look here, will you change clothes with me?
Charlie Ward. Faith, I'd swap soon enough if you weren't humbugging me. It's I that would look well with that suit on me! The peelers would all be touching their caps to me. You'd see them running out for me to sign summonses for them.
Paul Ruttledge. But I am not humbugging. I am in earnest.
Charlie Ward. In earnest! Then when I go back I'll commit Paddy Cockfight to prison for hitting me yesterday.
Paul Ruttledge. You don't believe me, but I will explain. I'm dead sick of this life; I want to get away; I want to escape—as you say, to pick up my living like the crows for a while.
Charlie Ward. To make your escape. Oh! that's different. [Coming closer.] But what is it you did? You don't look like one that would be in trouble. But sometimes a gentleman gets a bit wild when he has a drop taken.
Paul Ruttledge. Well, never mind. I will explain better while we are changing. Come over here to the potting shed. Make haste, those magistrates will be coming out.
Charlie Ward. The magistrates! Are they after you? Hurry on, then! Faith, they won't know you with this coat. [Looking at his rags.] It's a pity I didn't put on my old one coming out this morning.
[They go out through the garden. Thomas Ruttledge comes down steps from house with Colonel Lawley and Mr. Green.
Mr. Green. Yes, they have made me President of the County Horticultural Society. My speech was quite a success; it was punctuated with applause. I said I looked upon the appointment not as a tribute to my own merits, but to their public spirit and to the Society, which I assured them had come to stay.