To
his surprise and annoyance, however, Mr. Nott insisted on accompanying
him to his room, and without heeding Renshaw's cold "Goodnight,"
entered and closed the door behind him.
"P'raps," said Mr. Nott with a troubled air, "you disremember that when
you first kem here you asked me if you could hev that 'er loft that the
Frenchman had downstairs."
"No, I don't remember it," said Renshaw almost rudely. "But," he added,
after a pause, with the air of a man obliged to revive a stale and
unpleasant memory, "if I did--what about it?"
"Nuthin', only that you kin hev it to-morrow, ez that 'ere Frenchman is
movin' out," responded Nott. "I thought you was sorter keen about it
when you first kem."
"Umph! we'll talk about it to-morrow." Something in the look of wearied
perplexity with which Mr. Nott was beginning to regard his own _mal a
propos_ presence, arrested the young man's attention. "What's the
reason you didn't sell this old ship long ago, take a decent house in
the town, and bring up your daughter like a lady?" he asked, with a
sudden blunt good-humor.
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