This stroke of art was not lost. Christie looked up from her book;
pretended he had spoken to her, gave a fictitious yawn, and renewed the
negotiation with the air of one disposed to kill time.

She was dying for the story.

Commerce was twice broken off and renewed by each power in turn.

At last the bargain was struck at fourteen-pence.

Then Flucker came out, the honest merchant.

He had listened intently, with mercantile views.

He had the widow's sorrows all off pat.

He was not a bit affected himself, but by pure memory he remembered where
she had been most agitated or overcome.

He gave it Christie, word for word, and even threw in what dramatists
call "the business," thus:

"Here ye suld greet--"

"Here ye'll play your hand like a geraffe."

"Geraffe? That's a beast, I'm thinking."

"Na; it's the thing on the hill that makes signals."