"Ah, but what was it—in that grand book of yours?"
The boy stood, in his short buff tunic, regarding his father with shy amusement. The small round clear-skinned face was lovely with its blushes of faint rose; his eyes were big and blue, and his head was covered with thick curling locks of rich brown hair.
"Cleanliness comes next to godliness," he replied.
"Does it so, indeed?" exclaimed his father. "Then you're putting your godliness in a pretty low category!"
"What a nonsense," said Mary Tincler as the boy left them.
The Irishman and his dark-eyed Saxon wife sat down at the table waiting for their son.
"There's a bit of a randy in the Town Gardens tonight, Mary, dancing on the green, fireworks! When the boy is put to bed we'll walk that way."
Mary expressed her pleasure, but then declared she could not leave the boy alone in his bed.
"He'll not hurt, Mary, he has no fear in him. Give him the birthday gift before we go. Whisht, he's coming!"
The child, now clean and handsome, came to his chair and looked up at his father sitting opposite to him.