“So she was,” said the Major. “So she was. Said good-bye to us on her doorstep as if she thought she was a perfect Venus Ana—Ana something.”
“Anno Domini,” giggled Puffin.
“Well, well, we all get long in the tooth in time,” said Major Flint charitably. “Fine figure of a woman, though.”
“Eh?” said Puffin archly.
“Now none of your sailor-talk ashore, Captain,” said the Major, in high good humour. “I’m not a marrying man any more than you are. Better if I had been perhaps, more years ago than I care to think about. Dear me, my wound’s going to trouble me to-night.”
“What do you do for it, Major?” asked Puffin.
“Do for it? Think of old times a bit over my diaries.”
“Going to let the world have a look at them some day?” asked Puffin.
“No, sir, I am not,” said Major Flint. “Perhaps a hundred years hence—the date I have named in my will for their publication—someone may think them not so uninteresting. But all this toasting and buttering and grilling and frying your friends, and serving them up hot for all the old cats at a tea-table to mew over—Pah!”
Puffin was silent a moment in appreciation of these noble sentiments.