"It's absurd. It isn't even proper. . . ."
"Proper, George? You seem to suggest at times that I'm not a human being!"
His face was flushed with excitement and he took huge, deep breaths, which inflated his chest almost to the point of bursting off his waistcoat buttons. Was it the spring air, the new glands, or merely old-world memories that roused him to such ecstasy?
"If you're going to begin resurrecting some antiquated love affair," I said, "we shan't get to Africa for months. Which is it going to be—love or adventure?"
"Both!" cried Gran'pa.
[CHAPTER X]
THE MASSING OF THE ANCIENTS
I had been needlessly alarmed at the possibility of undue delay in leaving for Africa. Gran'pa undertook the resurrection of his fifty-year-old love affair in the same whirlwind fashion that had characterized his conversion to the glandular theory of youth.
He should have been a detective, for, in less than a week, he had traced the whereabouts of a little white-haired old maid of seventy summers. Her name was Sally Rebecca Froud. In spite of the antiquity of her Christian names, I liked her from the first. She had the sweetest and daintiest manners imaginable, and when Gran'pa invited her round to dinner one evening, I saw at once that he was desperately fond of her even now.
The meal was one of the most enjoyable I can remember. She brought to it just that subtle, artistic atmosphere which would have been imparted by the presence of a very valuable and exquisite piece of old Dresden china. All the grace and irreproachable womanliness of the crinoline period were there, but without any of its narrow-minded bigotry. She seemed to personify all the attributes one requires to make a grandmother tolerable and lovable. Her hands fluttered over Molly's fair hair like white moths, and when she stood on tiptoes to kiss her, it was with the air of a queen saluting a young goddess. When she moved there was a faint rustle of hidden silk, and the tenderness which dwelt in her lips and eyes soothed and captivated one immediately.