The Wrong Box by Robert Louis Stevenson;Lloyd Osbourne
page 48 of 221 (21%)
page 48 of 221 (21%)
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the door upon the sleeping patriarch.
The next moment the pair had jumped into the baggage van. 'What's the row about your Uncle Joseph?' enquired the younger traveller, mopping his brow. 'Does he object to smoking?' 'I don't know that there's anything the row with him,' returned the other. 'He's by no means the first comer, my Uncle Joseph, I can tell you! Very respectable old gentleman; interested in leather; been to Asia Minor; no family, no assets--and a tongue, my dear Wickham, sharper than a serpent's tooth.' 'Cantankerous old party, eh?' suggested Wickham. 'Not in the least,' cried the other; 'only a man with a solid talent for being a bore; rather cheery I dare say, on a desert island, but on a railway journey insupportable. You should hear him on Tonti, the ass that started tontines. He's incredible on Tonti.' 'By Jove!' cried Wickham, 'then you're one of these Finsbury tontine fellows. I hadn't a guess of that.' 'Ah!' said the other, 'do you know that old boy in the carriage is worth a hundred thousand pounds to me? There he was asleep, and nobody there but you! But I spared him, because I'm a Conservative in politics.' Mr Wickham, pleased to be in a luggage van, was flitting to and fro like a gentlemanly butterfly. |
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