“Not a bit of it. I advise you to take care how you make advances to her; she will slap you on the mouth for the slightest misdemeanour.”
“Slap me on the mouth!”
“Not the smallest doubt of it. She buffeted poor Major Stultz when he innocently made her a proposal of marriage, until his face, from deep red, turned to the richest purple.”
“Nay, now I know you are inventing—joking.”
“Not so much as you think, I assure you. Her sister is my authority. She softened the recital in some degree, it is true, by saying that Hildegarde was not often in a passion, and never with her.”
Zedwitz seated himself at the table, drummed on it with his fingers, and looked at Hamilton as if he expected to hear more.
“Perhaps, after all,” said Hamilton, “she is only a little hot-tempered. I have heard it asserted that passionate people were always good-hearted—in fact, most amiable, when not actually in a passion!”
“Who would have imagined that?” said Zedwitz, thoughtfully; “and with such an angel’s face!”
“Never trust an angel’s face!” cried Hamilton, laughing. “My brother John, who understands such things, says that angelic-looking women are very often devils, and, if not, they are bores; and of the two I prefer a devil to a bore, any day—even for a wife.”
Zedwitz rubbed his hand across his forehead, and looked dissatisfied.