"Three days may be needed," said he, gravely, "to fit a double set of
keys to every lock in the house. Shortridge will have one. L'Isle may
keep the other, and with it the power of letting himself in and out at
any minute of the twenty-four hours."
How stupid did his companions think themselves. The thing was now
patent to the dullest apprehension.
"It is curious," continued the colonel, "that Shortridge, so keen a
fellow in all business transactions (for both we and the government
have found him too sharp for us before now), should be in these little
delicate domestic relations such an egregious gull. You all know I do
not view these little matters from the parson's point of view; but
still, there is a propriety to be observed. To think," continued
Bradshawe, with a countenance of comic horror, "of his proposing to
make our friend Shortridge lie in a ditch, for his accommodation! Our
punctilious comrade is getting to be a very bare-faced fellow. Just
snatched from the brink of the grave, too," added he, in a sudden fit
of pious indignation. "What a deliberate, cold-blooded fellow!"
Having thus, by fitting a few chance hints to each other, brought out
a pretty piece of Spanish intrigue, that would have delighted Calderon
or Lope de Vega, the colonel emptied the decanter by filling the
glasses all round, and each man emptying his glass, the company
dispersed.
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