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As he walked rapidly to the station he grew more and more convinced that it was Alfred Hardie. And his reflections ran like this. "What a headpiece mamma has! But it did not strike her he would come to me first. Yet how plain that looks now: for of course I'm the duffer's only clue to Julia. These madmen are no fools, though. And how quiet he was that night!
"Oh, something about a duffer's set. Do go to her, and say you didn't mean to be unkind, there's a good boy." "All right." He knocked at Miss Wilkinson's door, but receiving no answer went in. He found her lying face downwards on her bed, weeping. He touched her on the shoulder. "I say, what on earth's the matter?" "Leave me alone. I never want to speak to you again." "What have I done?
"When there's anything he wants us to know, and he can find time, he'll tell us." "Huh!" half assented Eph. "Don't be forward about it," continued Hal. "Just play the waiting game and rely upon Mr. Farnum being as fair and square as he has any chance to be." "Hum" again nodded Eph. "Well, anyway, with farm labor at a premium, I'm not going to stay aboard to black the duffer's shoes."
I need not here touch upon the well-known and far-reaching results of the holding of Duffer's Drift, of the prevention thereby of Boer guns, ammunition, and reinforcements reaching one of their sorely pressed forces at a critical moment, and the ensuing victory gained by our side.
Septimus, with a twinkle, "I'll answer that question, my dear Charles, and not before." "You old humbug! You're so puffed up with sinful pride that you've stuck your topper on to your head the wrong way about." "Bless my soul," said the Duffer's father, "so I have." "That topper of the governor's," the Duffer remarked solemnly, "has seen twenty-five matches at least."
So encouraged he went on to say: "But when I got my hand on that old duffer's collar, and lowered him to the ladder, and the fire shot roaring out of the window after him, too late to eat him, and the crowd cheered the fireman and me, I did feel warm about the waistcoat, and, for the first time this ever so long, life seemed not quite ended.
"You wouldn't know her," he said, referring to La Signorina for they would always call her that. "When she heard of that duffer's death I swear that she believed you had a hand in it. But when she heard that the accident had occurred before you left the villa, she just collapsed. Oh, there was a devil of a mess; police agents, carabinieri, inspectors.
For the latest innovation Beechhurst was indebted to the young curate, who had a round full voice. He would intone the prayers. By this time my lady was tired of clerical vanities, and only remarked, with a little disdain in her voice, that Mr. Duffer's proper place was Whitchester Cathedral.
The Duffer's notions of topography were bounded by the cricket-ground on the one side of the Hill, and the footer-fields on the other; and his traditions held nothing much more romantic than A. J. Webbe's scores at Lord's. Fluff, as has been said, was too far removed from John to make him more than an occasional companion. And so, for several terms, John, for the most part, walked alone.
The bowling has degenerated into that of anaemic girls and two whacks to the boundary mean Victory. The new-comer is the square, thick-set fast bowler, the worst bat in the Eleven, but a fellow of determination, a slogger and a run-getter against village teams. He obeys instructions to the letter. The Duffer's fifth ball goes to the boundary. Three runs to make and two and a half minutes to play!
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