“Stop, auntie, dear, or you will have me afraid to meet the Herr. After holding him up as such a paragon, is it any wonder I should feel as small and insignificant as a mouse?”
“Come, come, you are not so foolish!”
“Of course, I’m not, really—I was only joking,” and Dorothy’s laugh rang out over the lawn as they seated themselves on the gallery to await the arrival of the guest. “But I do feel a trembling sensation when I think that I am to meet the great Herr Deichenberg, of whom I have heard so much, yet seen so little.”
“There is nothing to tremble over, my dear—nothing at all. He is just like other men; very ordinary, and surely kind-hearted to all with whom he comes in contact.”
As they were discussing the matter, Jim and Ephraim came around the corner of the house, their hands full of fishing tackle.
“Well, Aunt Betty,” greeted the boy, “we’re off for the old Chesapeake to court the denizens of the deep, and I’m willing to wager we’ll have fish for breakfast to-morrow morning.”
He pulled off his broad-brimmed straw hat and mopped a perspiring brow.
“Don’t be too sure of that,” returned Aunt Betty. “Fish do not always bite when you want them to. I know, for I’ve tried it, many’s the time.”
“Mah Miss Betty suah uster be er good fisher-woman,” quoth Ephraim, a light of pride in his eyes. “I’ve seen her sot on de bank ob de Chesapeake, en cotch as many as ’leben fish in one hour. Big fellers, too—none ob yo’ lil’ cat-fish en perch. Golly! I suah ’members de time she hooked dat ole gar, en hollered fo’ help tuh pull ’im out. Den all de folks rush’ up en grab de line, en ole Mistah Gar jes’ done come up outen de watah like he’d been shot out ob er gun.”
Slapping his knees at the recollection, Ephraim guffawed loudly, and with such enthusiasm that Aunt Betty forgot her infirmities and joined in most heartily.