“Ah,” said she, “you want to make him out to be older than he is. I knew his age to-day.”
“And does he know yours?”
“He may if he wishes it. Everybody in Boston knows it,—including yourself. Now tell me; what sort of man is Mr. Pryor?”
“He is a man highly esteemed in his own country.”
“So much I knew before; and he is highly esteemed here also. But I hardly understand what high estimation means in your country.”
“It is much the same thing in all countries, as I take it,” said I.
“There you are absolutely wrong. Here in the States, if a man be highly esteemed it amounts almost to everything; such estimation will carry him everywhere,—and will carry his wife everywhere too, so as to give her a chance of making standing ground for herself.”
“But Mr. Pryor has not got a wife.”
“Don’t be stupid. Of course he hasn’t got a wife, and of course you know what I mean.”
But I did not know what she meant. I knew that she was meditating whether or no it would be good for her to become Mrs. Pryor, and that she was endeavouring to get from me some information which might assist her in coming to a decision on that matter; but I did not understand the exact gist and point of her enquiry.