"I say, Fledge."
"My lord?"
"--You never _do_ really open your mouth, you know--except, I suppose,
when you eat----"
"Yes, my lord."
"You just, well--fumble with your lips. So--I say, Fledge, _have_ you
any teeth?"
And Fledge, possibly because he was a man of principle, but probably
also because he suspected that his master's next words might take the
form of an order to open his mouth, told the truth. He had three teeth
only.
"And look here, Fledge, why do William's toes turn out at such a fearful
angle?"
Pledge's heart was in the plate-closet at that moment, but his patience
was monumental.
"I don't know, my lord--unless it's because 'e's only just left off
being knife-boy--they get used to standing at the sink a-washing up, my
lord, and William's feet is large, so I dessay he turned 'is toes out in
order to get near and not splash."
This elucidation appeared plausible as well as interesting to
Kingsmead, and he felt that in learning something of the habits of the
genus knife-boy he had added to his stock of human information, which he
undoubtedly had.
Then at lunch there had been the little matter of Bicky's dressmaker's
bill. The mater had been her crossest, and Bicky her silentest, and the
bill, discussed in French, a disgusting and superfluous language, the
acquirement of which Kingsmead had used much skill in evading, lay on
the table.
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