'The market-place, now,' said Martin. 'Is that built?'
'That?' said the agent, sticking his toothpick into the weathercock on
the top. 'Let me see. No; that ain't built.'
'Rather a good job to begin with--eh, Mark?' whispered Martin nudging
him with his elbow.
Mark, who, with a very stolid countenance had been eyeing the plan and
the agent by turns, merely rejoined 'Uncommon!'
A dead silence ensued, Mr Scadder in some short recesses or vacations of
his toothpick, whistled a few bars of Yankee Doodle, and blew the dust
off the roof of the Theatre.
'I suppose,' said Martin, feigning to look more narrowly at the plan,
but showing by his tremulous voice how much depended, in his mind, upon
the answer; 'I suppose there are--several architects there?'
'There ain't a single one,' said Scadder.
'Mark,' whispered Martin, pulling him by the sleeve, 'do you hear that?
But whose work is all this before us, then?' he asked aloud.
'The soil being very fruitful, public buildings grows spontaneous,
perhaps,' said Mark.
He was on the agent's dark side as he said it; but Scadder instantly
changed his place, and brought his active eye to bear upon him.
Pages:
654
655
656
657
658
659
660
661
662
663
664
665
666
667
668
669
670
671
672
673
674
675
676
677
678