"Well, certainly, if brevity be the soul of wit, you have improved in one line," said Rose.
"They teach it out there," said Magnus. "'Mr. Kindred, your head is on one side, sir!'--'Yes, sir. Which side, sir?'"
"And what did you get for being so saucy?" asked the mother, as the laugh died away.
"Nothing that time. Even Towser can't skin a man unless he gets hold of him. But wherever is Cherry? When you all came out of the first bush, I thought she would jump out of the second."
"She's at home," said Rose. "We wanted her to come, and she wouldn't."
"But she did the first time," said Violet eagerly; "the first day we thought you might come."
"Oh, ho!--and as I didn't show up then she put on her high-heeled shoes," said Magnus. "Girls are all just alike the world over."
"No, they are not!" cried both the charming specimens then present. "And you shall not say that of Cherry. She is like nobody else--and nobody else is like her."
And privately, Magnus thought his own two sisters very unlike most other girls. With their fresh, unjaded faces, undoctored complexions, untrammelled feet and waists, and unspoiled minds, they made a wonderful sweet contrast to Miss Dashaway and Miss Flirt. Magnus had not known how his estimate of women had run down among the crowd till he found it mounting up again, ten degrees at a time.
Even Cherry's absenting herself--it provoked him heartily, and he felt himself much injured, but it was after all a refreshing change after Miss Dangleum's ways. Yes, demonstrations were the man's business, and in his present mood Magnus felt quite equal to them, could he but get hold of the right person.
No half-grown girl in half-long dresses appeared, however, as they reached the house, but for a few minutes Magnus had all he could manage. The old dog (prudently left at home) was nearly as wild over the meeting as his young master; jumped upon him, clung to him, danced round him, whimpered, whined, and barked for joy. It was not five minutes before the two were rolling down the grass slope together, then running a sharp race, and then flying all over the old house from room to room. Magnus shouldered his trunk and rushed upstairs with it, and Plato dashed after him, wakening all the echoes that were anywhere about. The two girls, putting rolls in the oven and setting on cream and butter, almost danced in their tiptoe joy; the mother in the small sitting-room hid her face in her hands, and cried and gave thanks. Just to hear that boy's step overhead, what was it like? And then to have the pair come racing down the old stairs when supper was ready, Plato barking in a perfect scream of delight;--do you wonder that the prayer for a blessing was spoken low and falteringly? or that a hush filled all the room for some moments thereafter?