'
'That is, he was not a boy at all, I suppose?' interrupted Ralph.
'Well,' returned Squeers, briskly, as if he felt relieved by the
suggestion, 'he might have been nigh twenty. He wouldn't seem so old,
though, to them as didn't know him, for he was a little wanting here,'
touching his forehead; 'nobody at home, you know, if you knocked ever so
often.'
'And you DID knock pretty often, I dare say?' muttered Ralph.
'Pretty well,' returned Squeers with a grin.
'When you wrote to acknowledge the receipt of this trifle of money as
you call it,' said Ralph, 'you told me his friends had deserted him long
ago, and that you had not the faintest clue or trace to tell you who he
was. Is that the truth?'
'It is, worse luck!' replied Squeers, becoming more and more easy and
familiar in his manner, as Ralph pursued his inquiries with the less
reserve. 'It's fourteen years ago, by the entry in my book, since a
strange man brought him to my place, one autumn night, and left him
there; paying five pound five, for his first quarter in advance. He
might have been five or six year old at that time--not more.
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