Part 40 (2/2)

”Come, Cecilia,” she cried, after a pause of a moment, ”we trespa.s.s too long on the patience of the gentlemen; not only to keep possession of our seats, ten minutes after the cloth has been drawn! but even to introduce our essences, and tapes, and needles, among the Madeira, and-- shall I add, cigars, colonel?”

”Not while we are favored with the company of Miss Plowden, certainly.”

”Come, my coz; I perceive the colonel is growing particularly polite, which is a never-failing sign that he tires of our presence.”

Cecilia rose, and was leading the way to the door, when Katherine turned to the lad, and added:

”You can follow us to the drawing-room, child, where we can make our purchases, without exposing the mystery of our toilets.”

”Miss Plowden has forgotten my hornbook, I believe,” said Borroughcliffe, advancing from the standing group who surrounded the table; ”possibly I can find some work in the basket of the boy, better fitted for the improvement of a grown-up young gentleman than this elementary treatise.”

Cecilia, observing him to take the basket from the lad, resumed her seat, and her example was necessarily followed by Katherine; though not without some manifest indications of vexation.

”Come hither, boy, and explain the uses of your wares. This is soap, and this a penknife, I know; but what name do you affix to this?”

”That? that is tape,” returned the lad, with an impatience that might very naturally be attributed to the interruption that was thus given to his trade.

”And this?”

”That?” repeated the stripling, pausing, with a hesitation between sulkiness and doubt; ”that?--”

”Come, this is a little ungallant!” cried Katherine; ”to keep three ladies dying with impatience to possess themselves of their finery, while you detain the boy, to ask the name of a tambouring-needle!”

”I should apologize for asking questions that are so easily answered; but perhaps he will find the next more difficult to solve,” returned Borroughcliffe, placing the subject of his inquiries in the palm of his hand, in such a manner as to conceal it from all but the boy and himself, ”This has a name too; what is it?”

”That?--that--is sometimes called--white-line.”

”Perhaps you mean a white lie?”

”How, sir!” exclaimed the lad, a little fiercely, ”a lie!”

”Only a white one,” returned the captain. ”What do you call this. Miss Duns...o...b..?”

”We call it bobbin, sir, generally, in the north,” said the placid Alice.

”Ay, bobbin, or white-line; they are the same thing,” added the young trader.

”They are? I think, now, for a professional man, you know but little of the terms of your art,” observed Borroughcliffe, with an affectation of irony; ”I never have seen a youth of your years who knew less. What names, now, would you affix to this, and this, and this?”

While the captain was speaking he drew from his pockets the several instruments that the c.o.c.kswain had made use of the preceding night to secure his prisoner.

”That,” exclaimed the lad, with the eagerness of one who would vindicate his reputation, ”is rattlin-stuff; and this is marline; and that is sennit.”

”Enough, enough,” said Borroughcliffe; ”you have exhibited sufficient knowledge to convince me that you _do_ know something of your _trade_, and nothing of these articles. Mr. Griffith, do you claim this boy?”

”I believe I must, sir,” said the young sea-officer, who had been intently listening to the examination. ”On whatever errand you have now ventured here, Mr. Merry, it is useless to affect further concealment.”

”Merry!” exclaimed Cecilia Howard; ”is it you, then, my cousin? Are you, too, fallen into the power of your enemies! was it not enough that--”

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