Helen laughed. "What a man you are for exaggerating!" she flattered him. Then she sat down.
He considered that he was gradually winding in his line with immense skill. "Ay," he ejaculated, with an absent air, "it's a fancy o' mine."
"How much do you want to leave?" Helen questioned, faintly smiling.
"Don't you bother your head about that," said he. "You may take it from me as it's a tidy sum. And when I'm dead and gone, and you've got it all, then ye can do as ye feel inclined."
"I shall beat her, as sure as eggs!" he told himself.
"All this means that he'll give in when it comes to the point," she told herself.
And aloud she said: "Have you had supper, uncle?"
"No," he replied.
The next development was that, without another word, she removed her gloves, lifted her pale hands to her head, and slowly drew hatpins from her hat. Then she removed her hat, and plunged the pins into it again. He could scarcely refrain from snatching off his own tasselled Turkish cap and pitching it in the air. He felt as if he had won the Battle of Hastings, or defeated the captain of the bowling club in a single-handed match.
"And to think," he reflected, "that I should ha' given in to her by this time if I hadn't got more sense in my little finger than—" etc.