He had
never liked the prospect, though he had been prepared to go through
with it, and to feel that it was definitely cancelled made up for a
good deal.
His mind next turned to his immediate future. What were they going to
do with him? On this point he felt tolerably comfortable. This
imprisonment could mean nothing more than that he would be compelled to
disgorge a ransom. This did not trouble him. He was rich, and, now that
the situation had been switched to a purely business basis, he felt
that he could handle it.
In any case, there was nothing to be gained by sitting up, so he went
to bed, like a good philosopher.
The sun was pouring through the barred window when he was awoken by the
entrance of a gigantic figure bearing food and drink.
He recognized him as one of the scurvy knaves who had dined at the
bottom of the room the night before--a vast, beetle-browed fellow with
a squint, a mop of red hair, and a genius for silence. To Agravaine's
attempts to engage him in conversation he replied only with grunts, and
in a short time left the room, closing and locking the door behind him.
He was succeeded at dusk by another of about the same size and
ugliness, and with even less conversational _elan_. This one did
not even grunt.
Small-talk, it seemed, was not an art cultivated in any great measure
by the lower orders in the employment of Earl Dorm.
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