'It's—it's about the cleverest thing I've come across in all my born days,' stammered Colonel Baigent, collapsing into his chair, and then suddenly clutching the arms of it and peering forward.
'But, of course, I've known you for ever so long, really,' she went on, and nodded again as if to reassure him.
'Oh! "of course," is it? I—I say, won't you sit down and have a nut or two—or a fig?'
'Thank you.' She gave him quite a grown-up bow, and seated herself. 'I'll take a fig; nuts give you the indigestion at this time of night.' She picked up a fig demurely, and laid it on a plate he pushed towards her. 'I hope I'm behaving nicely?' she said, looking up at him with the most engaging candour; 'because Aunt Louisa says you always had the most beautiful manners. In fact, that's what made her take to you, long—oh! ever so long—before you became famous. And now you're the Bayard of India!'
'But, excuse me—'
She had begun to munch her fig, but interrupted him with another nod.
'Yes, I know what you are going to say. That's the name they give to another general out in India, don't they? But Aunt Louisa declares he won't hold a candle to you—though I don't know why he should want to do anything of the sort.'
'It's uncommonly kind of your Aunt Louisa—' he began again.
'Do you know her?' the child asked, with disconcerting directness.
'That's just the trouble with me' Colonel Baigent confessed.