They were interrupted.
“She is too great a girl for that sort of thing now, Mr. Alexander, if you please. Be so good as to put her down, sir.”
It was the voice of the housekeeper that spoke, as she entered the room.
“I beg your pardon, Mrs. Sterling,” said Alexander, laughing, and releasing his favorite; “but it is hard to realize that my little pet is growing up.”
“She is thirteen, sir,” curtly answered the housekeeper.
“Dear me! Is she so? Why I dandled her when she was a baby! What an old man I am growing to be, to be sure!”
“Not quite old enough to be her father, Mr. Alexander, and therefore too young to make a pet of her.”
“Come, now, this is a pretty way to welcome me home with a rebuke the first thing.”
“I am very glad to see you home, sir, however; and—Here is Mrs. Lyon!”
The housekeeper cut her speech short, as the old lady entered the room.