Mr. Blundell, a great stickler for accuracy, reduced the time to five minutes.
“And now,” said the aggrieved Mr. Turnbull, “now, so far as I can see, she’s struck with Daly. If she has him it’ll be years and years before they can marry. She seems crazy about heroes. She was talking to me the other night about them. Not to put too fine a point on it, she was talking about you.”
Mr. Blundell blushed with pleased surprise.
“Said you were not a hero,” explained Mr. Turnbull. “Of course, I stuck up for you. I said you’d got too much sense to go putting your life into danger. I said you were a very careful man, and I told her how particular you was about damp sheets. Your housekeeper told me.”
“It’s all nonsense,” said Blundell, with a fiery face. “I’ll send that old fool packing if she can’t keep her tongue quiet.”
“It’s very sensible of you, John,” said Mr. Turnbull, “and a sensible girl would appreciate it. Instead of that, she only sniffed when I told her how careful you always were to wear flannel next to your skin. She said she liked dare-devils.”
“I suppose she thinks Daly is a dare-devil,” said the offended Mr. Blundell. “And I wish people wouldn’t talk about me and my skin. Why can’t they mind their own business?”
Mr. Turnbull eyed him indignantly, and then, sitting in a very upright position, slowly filled his pipe, and declining a proffered match rose and took one from the mantel-piece.
“I was doing the best I could for you,” he said, staring hard at the ingrate. “I was trying to make Venia see what a careful husband you would make. Miss Sippet herself is most particular about such things—and Venia seemed to think something of it, because she asked me whether you used a warming-pan.”