A
hundred pounds reward, and as the paper says, the cat may be under
your very nose. We're all a 'unting for it, mister."
She withdrew. George crossed the room; pressed his head, against the
cold marble of the mantelpiece. His brows were burning; in the pit of
his stomach a sinking sensation gave him pain. "All a 'unting for it!
all a 'unting for it!"
When the Rose had bulged her flanks with the complete haddock, when,
responsive to a "Stuff your head in that, you brute," the patient
creature had lapped a slop-bowl full of milk, George again imprisoned
her; rushed, basket under arm, for open country.
Mr. Pinner in the bar-parlour, as George fled through, was reading
from a paper to a stable hand, a servant girl, and a small red-headed
Pinner boy: "It may be in John o' Groats," he read, "or it may be in
Land's End." He thumped the bar. "'Ear that! Well, it may be in
Dippleford Admiral."
It was precisely because it was in Dippleford Admiral that his young
inventor lodger fled through the bar without so much as a civil "good
morning."
* * * * *
At the post-office, keeping a drumming foot on the terrified Rose,
George sent a telegram to Mr. Marrapit.
_"Think on track. Must be cautious. Don't tell Brunger."_
He flung down eightpence halfpenny; fled in the direction of a wood
that plumed a distant hill.
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