“How long is it since you poured out tea for me, Ermine?”
“Thirteen years next June, when you and Harry used to come in from the cricket field, so late and hot that you were ashamed to present yourself in civilized society at the Great House.”
“As if nobody from the Parsonage ever came down to look on at the cricket.”
“Yes; being summoned by all the boys to see that nothing would teach a Scotchman cricket.”
“Ah! you have got the last word, for here comes Ailie.”
“Of course,” said Alison, coming in; “Ermine has had the pith of the story, so I had better ask at once what it is.”
“That the Beauchamp Eleven beat Her Majesty’s —th Foot on Midsummer Day, 1846, is the pith of what I have as yet heard,” said Ermine.
“And that Beauchamp ladies are every whit as full of mischief as they used to be in those days, is the sum of what I have told,” added Colin.
“Yes,” said Ermine, “he has most loyally kept his word of reserving all for you. He has not even said whether Mauleverer is taken.”
“My story is grave and sad enough,” said Colin, laying aside all his playfulness, and a serious expression coming over his features; but, at the same time, the landlady’s sandy cat, which, like all other animals, was very fond of him, and had established herself on his knee as soon as Rose had left it vacant, was receiving a certain firm, hard, caressing stroking, which resulted in vehement purrs on her part, and was evidently an outlet of suppressed exaltation.