“Well, gentlemen, I hope you had a pleasant ride,” he remarked, following them into the house. “You didn't see your way to stop by Uplands, I reckon?”
“That we did, sir,” said Diggs, who was never bashful with the Major. “In fact, we made ourselves rather useful, I believe.”
“They're charming young ladies over there, eh?” inquired the Major, genially; and a little later when Dan and he were alone, he put the same question to his grandson. “They're delightful girls, are they not, my boy?” he ventured incautiously. “You have noticed, I dare say, how your grandmother takes to Betty—and she's not a woman of many fancies, is your grandmother.”
“Oh, but Virginia!” exclaimed Dan, with enthusiasm. “I wish you could have seen her in her red dress to-day. You don't half realize what a thundering beauty that girl is. Why, she positively took my breath away.”
The Major chuckled and rubbed his hands together.
“I don't, eh?” he said, scenting a romance as an old war horse scents a battle. “Well, well, maybe not; but I see where the wind blows anyway, and you have my congratulations on either hand. I shan't deny that we old folks had a leaning to Betty; but youth is youth, and we shan't oppose your fancy. So I congratulate you, my boy, I congratulate you.”
“Ah, she wouldn't look at me, sir,” declared Dan, feeling that the pace was becoming a little too impetuous. “I only wish she would; but I'd as soon expect the moon to drop from the skies.”
“Not look at you! Pooh, pooh!” protested the old gentleman, indignantly. “Proper pride is not vanity, sir; and there's never been a Lightfoot yet that couldn't catch a woman's eye, if I do say it who should not. Pooh, pooh! it isn't a faint heart that wins the ladies.”
“I know you to be an authority, my dear grandpa,” admitted the young man, lightly glancing into the gilt-framed mirror above the mantel. “If there's any of your blood in me, it makes for conquest.” From the glass he caught the laughter in his eyes and turned it on his grandfather.
“It ill becomes me to rob the Lightfoots of one of their chief distinctions,” said the Major, smiling in his turn. “We are not a proud people, my boy; but we've always fought like men and made love like gentlemen, and I hope that you will live up to your inheritance.”