“Why, Simon?”

“Why, sir, ’tain’t me as ought to tell, and yet I don’t feel comfortable.  I wish I could ’a had a confabulation with yer afore this performance come off.  I hain’t got no doubts in my mind but that hinfidel and his dootiful brother hev got dealin’s with the devil.”

Simon rose and went to the door, opened it, and peered cautiously around.  “That Egyptian is a watcher,” he said grimly, “and I don’t like either of ’em.”

“What’s the matter, Simon?”

“Why, this yer morning, I wur exchangin’ a few pleasant remarks with one of the maid-servants, when I hears the Egyptian say, ’It’s gwine beautiful.’  ‘How?’ says t’other.  ‘He’ll nibble like hanything,’ was the answer, and then I hearn a nasty sort o’ laugh.  Soon after, I see you with a bootiful young lady, and I see that hinfidel a-watchin’ yer, with a snaky look in his eyes.  And so I kep on watchin’, and scuse me, yer honour, but I can guess as ’ow things be, and I’m fear’d as ’ow this waccination dodge is a trick o’ this ’ere willain.”

“Explain yourself, Simon.”

“Well, sir, I knows as ’ow you’ve only bin yer one day, but I could see in a minit as ’ow you was a smitten with a certain young lady, and I can see, too, as ’ow that white-eyed willain is smitten in the same quarter, and he sees ’ow things be, and he means business.”

It was by no means pleasant to hear my affairs talked of in this way, and it was a marvel to me how Simon could have learnt so much, but I have found that a certain class of English servant seems to find out everything about the house with which they are connected, and I am afraid I was very careless as to who saw the state of my feelings.  At any rate, Simon guessed how things were, and, more than that, he believed that Voltaire had some sinister design against me.

“What do you mean by what you call the vaccination dodge?” I asked, after a second’s silence.

“Scuse me, yer honour, but since that doctor waccinated me and nearly killed me by it, tough as I be, I come to call all tomfoolery by the same name.  I’ve been in theatres, yer honour, and played in pieces, and I’ve known the willain in the play get up a shindy like this.  I knows they’re on’y got up to ‘arrow up the feelin’s o’ tender females; but I’m afeared as ’ow this Voltaire ‘ev got somethin’ in his head, a-concoctin’ like.”

“Nonsense, Simon,” I said.  “You are thinking about some terrible piece you’ve acted in, and your imagination is carrying away your judgment.”

“I hope as ’ow ’tis, sur; but I don’t think so.  If you chop me up, sur, you’ll not find sixpenno’th of imagination in my carcase, but I calcalate I’m purty ‘eavy wi’ judgment.  Never mind, sur; Simon Slowden is in the ’ouse, if you should want help, sur.”