"How confoundedly the years flit!
Nineteen--and on me soul, our poor youth looks as if he hadn't a
single gentlemanly vice to bless himself with!"
"Not one, Jervas, my boy," quoth my uncle George, shaking his comely
head at me. "Not one, begad, and that's the dooce of it! It seems he
don't swear, he don't drink, he don't gamble, he don't make love, he
don't even--"
"Don't, George," exclaimed my aunt Julia in her sternest tone, her
handsome face flushed, her stately back very rigid.
"Don't what, Julia?"
"Fill our nephew's mind with your own base masculine ideas--I forbid."
"But damme--no, Julia, no--I mean, bless us! What's to become of a
man--what's a man to do who don't--"
"Cease, George!"
"But he's almost a man, ain't he?"
"Certainly not; Peregrine is--my nephew--"
"And ours, Julia. We are his legal guardians besides--"
"And set him in my care until he comes of age!" retorted my aunt
defiantly.
"And there, happy youth, is his misfortune!" sighed my uncle Jervas.
"Misfortune?" echoed my aunt in whisper so awful that I, for one,
nearly trembled. "Misfortune!" she repeated. "Hush! Silence! Not a
word! I must think this over! Misfortune!"
In the dreadful pause ensuing, I glanced half-furtively from one to
other of my three guardians; at my uncle Jervas, lounging gracefully
in his chair, an exquisite work of art from glossy curls to polished
Hessians; at my uncle George, standing broad back to the mantel, a
graceful, stalwart figure in tight-fitting riding-coat, buckskins and
spurred boots; at my wonderful aunt, her dark and statuesque beauty as
she sat, her noble form posed like an offended Juno, dimpled chin on
dimpled fist, dark brows bent above long-lashed eyes, ruddy lips
close-set and arched foot tapping softly beneath the folds of her
ample robe.
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