“Ay! Sometimes the schoolmaster and the pupil are both abroad. Why, how soon you rust in my absence! You don’t understand yet? Those fellows who were here one night. They are the scouts I speak of, as doing me the honour to attend me after dark.”

“How long has this been going on?” asked Lightwood, opposing a serious face to the laugh of his friend.

“I apprehend it has been going on, ever since a certain person went off. Probably, it had been going on some little time before I noticed it: which would bring it to about that time.”

“Do you think they suppose you to have inveigled her away?”

“My dear Mortimer, you know the absorbing nature of my professional occupations; I really have not had leisure to think about it.”

“Have you asked them what they want? Have you objected?”