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Misspellings omitted, it ran thus: "Sir, If so be you wants to know where you come from, and where to look for them as belongs to you, come to the public at the foot of the hill this evening, with a few pounds in your pocket to open the lips of them as knows. But fair play, mind. Gearge bean't such a vool as a looks, and cart-horses won't draw it out of un, if you sets on the police.
"What'll Master Lake say to that?" "Don't 'ee tell un, Gearge!" Abel implored; "and, O Gearge! let I tell mother about the word. Maybe she've heard tell of it. Let I show her the letter, Gearge. She'll read it for 'ee. She's a scholard, is mother." There was no mistaking now the wrath in George's face. The fury that is fed by fear blazes pretty strongly at all times.
One of the men frightened me by saying, 'By Gearge! I'll in with you into a gig, and off with you after that ther' faller. He pretended to mean it, and started up. I watched him without flinching. He remarked that if I 'had not cut my lucky from school, and tossed my cap for a free life, he was whatever may be expressed by a slap on the thigh.
But, as George beat his way home over the downs in the dusk, he said aloud, under cover of the roaring wind, and in all the security of the open country, "Vive pound! vive pound! And a offered me vive shilling for un. Master Lake, you be dog-ged cute; but Gearge bean't quite such a vool as a looks." After a short time the advertisement was withdrawn.
George's small eyes gave a slight squint, as they were apt to do when he was thinking profoundly. "Abel," said he, "can thee read writing, my boy?" "I think I could, Gearge," said Abel, "if 'twas pretty plain."
In return for this speech, the waggoner favoured him with a stare, followed by the exclamation: 'Oh, no! dang that! 'Why, what's the matter? quoth Evan. 'You en't goin' to be off, for to leave me and Gearge in the lurch there, with that ther' young woman, in that ther' pickle! returned the waggoner.
There be a sum to be easily earned by a sharp-eyed chap with good luck on 's side." "And how then, Master Chuter?" said George, pausing, with the steaming mug half-way to his lips. "Haw, haw!" roared the inn-keeper: "you be a sharp-eyed chap, too! Do 'ee think 'twould suit thee, Gearge? Thee's a sprack chap, sartinly, Gearge!"
The curiosity of the company was by this time aroused, and Master Chuter explained: "'Tis a gentleman by the name of Ford as is advertising for a pocket-book, a seems to have lost on the downs, near to Master Lake's windmill. 'Tis thy way, too, Gearge, after all. Thee must get up yarly, Gearge. 'Tis the yarly bird catches the worm.
'Warn't he like that Myzepper chap, I see at the circus, bound athert gray mare! chuckled the waggoner. 'So he 'd 'a gone on, had ye 'a let 'n. No wulves waddn't wake Gearge till he 'd slept it out. Then he 'd say, "marnin'!" to 'm. Are ye 'wake now, Gearge?
"I would, Gearge, I would!" cried Abel, his eyes sparkling with earnestness. "I can teach thee thy letters, and by the time thee's learned all I know, maybe I'll have been to school again, and learned some more." This was the foundation of a curious kind of friendship between Abel and the miller's man.