‘Truly they would be unbearable if I had not also been unbearable myself as well.’—Goethe.
When Mr. Crosby had told the Barrys that he would come down next day for a game of tennis, they had not altogether believed in his coming, so that when they see him from afar off, through the many holes in the hedge, walking towards them down the village street, surprise is their greatest sentiment.
‘Susan,’ says Dominick solemnly, pausing racket in hand, ‘it must be you. I always told you your face was your fortune, and a very small one at that. You’ll have to marry him, and then we’ll all go and live with you for ever. That’ll be a treat for you, and will doubtless make up for the fact that he is emulating the Great Methuselah. If I can say a good word for you, I—Oh, how d’ye do, Mr. Crosby? Brought your racket, too, I see. Carew, now we’ll make up a set: Mr. Crosby and—’
‘Miss Susan, if I may,’ says Crosby, looking into Susan’s charming face whilst holding her hand in greeting. There are any amount of greetings to be got through when you go to see the Barrys. They are all always en évidence, and all full of life and friendliness. Even little Bonnie hurries up on his stick, and gives him a loving greeting. The child’s face is so sweet and so happily friendly that Crosby stoops and kisses him.
‘Certainly you may,’ says Susan genially; ‘but I’m not so good a player as Betty. She can play like anything. But to-day she has got a bad cold in her head. Well’—laughing—‘come on; we can try, and, after all, we can only be beaten.’
They are, as it happens, and very badly, too, Mr. Crosby, though no doubt good at big game, being rather a tyro at tennis.
‘I apologize,’ says he, when the game is at an end, and they have all seated themselves upon the ground to rest and gather breath; ‘I’m afraid Su—Miss Susan—you will hardly care to play with me again.’
‘I told you you could call me Susan,’ says she calmly. ‘Somehow, I dislike the Miss before it. Betty told you Miss Barry sounded like Aunt Jemima, but I think Miss Susan sounds like Jane.’
‘Poor old Jane! And she’s got such an awful nose!’ says Betty. ‘I think I’d rather be like Aunt Jemima than her.’
‘Susan hasn’t got an awful nose,’ says Bonnie, stroking Susan’s dainty little Grecian appendage fondly. ‘It’s a nice one.’