Showing that he was taken by surprise, the old man looked at his master with some passing confusion, which the master highly enjoyed.
“Is she in the house I pay rent and taxes for in Saint Mary Axe?” demanded Fledgeby.
“No, sir.”
“Is she in your garden up atop of that house—gone up to be dead, or whatever the game is?” asked Fledgeby.
“No, sir.”
“Where is she then?”
Riah bent his eyes upon the ground, as if considering whether he could answer the question without breach of faith, and then silently raised them to Fledgeby’s face, as if he could not.
“Come!” said Fledgeby. “I won’t press that just now. But I want to know this, and I will know this, mind you. What are you up to?”
The old man, with an apologetic action of his head and hands, as not comprehending the master’s meaning, addressed to him a look of mute inquiry.
“You can’t be a gallivanting dodger,” said Fledgeby. “For you’re a ‘regular pity the sorrows,’ you know—if you do know any Christian rhyme—‘whose trembling limbs have borne him to’—et cetrer. You’re one of the Patriarchs; you’re a shaky old card; and you can’t be in love with this Lizzie?”
“O, sir!” expostulated Riah. “O, sir, sir, sir!”
“Then why,” retorted Fledgeby, with some slight tinge of a blush, “don’t you out with your reason for having your spoon in the soup at