“There was little conversation between them, just an oddly companionable silence. “What time is it?” Daisy would ask every now and then, and he would produce a pocket watch.
Mildly intrigued by the jangle of objects in his coat pocket, Daisy demanded to see what was inside it.
“You’ll be disappointed,” Swift said as he unearthed the collection of items. He dumped the lot into her lap while Daisy sorted through it all.
“You’re worse than a ferret,” she said with a grin. There was the folding knife and the fishing line, a few loose coins, a pen nib, the pair of spectacles, a little tin of soap— Bowman’s, of course— and a slip of folded waxed paper containing willowbark powder. Holding the paper between thumb and forefinger, Daisy asked, “Do you have headaches, Mr. Swift?”
“No. But your father does whenever he gets bad news. And I’m usually the one who delivers it.”
Daisy laughed and picked up a tiny silver match case from the pile in her lap. “Why matches? I thought you didn’t smoke.”
“One never knows when a fire will be needed.”
Daisy held up a paper of straight pins and raised her brows questioningly. “I use them to attach documents,” he explained. “But they’ve been useful on other occasions.”
She let a teasing note enter her voice. “Is there any emergency for which you are not prepared, Mr. Swift?”
“Miss Bowman, if I had enough pockets I could save the world.”