Arnold did not understand, did not even hear, leaning back, long, relaxed, apathetic, in his great wicker-chair and rolling a cigarette with a detached air, as though his hands were not a part of him. But Sylvia heard, and understood, even to the hostility in the old gentleman's well-bred voice. "Being in Capua usually referring to the fact that the Carthaginians went to pieces that winter?" she asked. "Oh yes, of course I know that. Good gracious! I was brought up on the idea of the dangers of being in Capua. Perhaps that's why I always thought it would be such fun to get there." She spoke rebelliously.
"They got everlastingly beaten by the Romans," advanced Mr.
Sommerville.
"Yes, but they had had one grand good time before! The Romans couldn't take that away from them! I think the Carthaginians got the best of it!" Provocative, light-hearted malice was in her sparkling face. She was thinking to herself with the reckless bravado of youth, "Well, since he insists, I'll give him some ground for distrusting my character!"
Arnold suddenly emitted a great puff of smoke and a great shout of "Help! help! Molly to the rescue!" and when a little white-clad creature flitting past the door turned and brought into that quiet spot of leafy shadow the dazzling quickness of her smile, her eyes, her golden hair, he said to her nonchalantly: "Just in time to head them off. Sylvia and your grandfather were being so high-brow I was beginning to feel faint,"
Molly laughed flashingly. "Did Grandfather keep his end up? I bet he couldn't!"
Arnold professed an entire ignorance of the relative status. "Oh, I fell off so far back I don't know who got in first. Who was this man Capua, anyhow? I'm a graduate of Harvard University and I never heard of him."
"I'm a graduate of Miss Braddon's Mountain School for Girls," said
Molly, "and I think it's a river."
Mr. Sommerville groaned out, exaggerating a real qualm, "What my mother would have said to such ignorance, prefaced by 'I bet!' from the lips of a young lady!"
"Your mother," said Molly, "would be my great-grandmother!" She disposed of him conclusively by this statement and went on: "And I'm not a young lady. Nobody is nowadays."
"What are you, if a mere grandfather may venture to inquire?" asked
Mr. Sommerville deferentially.