“May I, honey? Well, anyhow, she told me how ‘sinner’ meant Sir and Mr. in the foreign language. Now, if all the Sirs and Mr.’s in foreign lands are so wicked and so barefaced as to call themselves and each other sinners, in that defiant manner, to their very faces, I say it don’t speak well for foreign lands, and the sooner we get back to New York and Brother More’s ministry the better.”
“I quite agree with you, Mrs. Downie,” said Hereward, laughing.
“And them waiters at the Hotel of—no; I mean the Hotel do Love—which I thought they called them goslings, but she says they were ‘go-soons,’ and that name fitted them young mounseers right well, ’cause the spry way they did fly around was enough to make one’s head giddy. But there! I reckon as I am letting my tongue run before my wit.”
“Oh, now, Aunt Sophie, you shall not say such wicked things about yourself. But tell me, did my father leave no message for us?”
“Yes, honey. He asked me to tell you that he would be here airly to-morrow morning. And I reckon as that don’t mean seven or eight o’clock, as it would with us, but more likely half-past eleven or a quarter to twelve. He said he wouldn’t interrupt you this first evening of your meeting. The ‘sinner’ is right-down considerate—for a sinner. And I must not intrude longer, neither,” said Aunt Sophie, rising to leave the small salon in which this interview had taken place.
Both Hereward and Lilith protested against her going, but she said:
“Children, I have to see the remnants of the wedding feast gathered into hampers, and tied up and sent out to be distributed to the poor. And I reckon there will be a great many more than ‘twelve baskets full.’ The wine and fruit and potted things is to be sent to the Hope-it-all of Sand Marree, or some such name. Antoine knows. But the baroness wanted me to see to it, to keep temptation out of the way of the weak. You’ll excuse me now?”
“Yes, Aunt Sophie, since you must go,” said Lilith.
“And I’ll send your tea up into this room, so you can have it all to yourselves tater-tater, as these funny foreigners say of two together, though what they mean by it I don’t know, unless it is potatoes, which they do know how to cook—I will say that for them—though why potatoes in this case nobody but a foreigner could tell. Well, oh river! that means good-bye, or something of that sort. I know the mounseers often say it when they go ’way.”
So speaking, half to her friends, half to herself, in her soft, slow tones, Aunt Sophie passed out of the room.