“Quite as soon as we are wanted, if your amiable and complimentary friend has any voice in the matter,” returned Alice, sotto voce.
“Nonsense,” was the reply in the same tone; “you know nothing about him, you silly child. Harry is the kindest-hearted, best-tempered fellow in the world, as you’ll find out before long.”
Alice’s only reply was an incredulous toss of her pretty head, and the parties separated.
“Of all the puppies I ever beheld, that creature D’Almayne is the most insufferable—the very sight of him irritates me. What business has he to pay his absurd compliments to your sister, when he has only known her for a few hours? If I were you, I should not stand it.”
“At all events, his compliments are of a more civil nature than yours,” returned Hazlehurst with a smile; “why, Harry, you are becoming as peppery a character as your namesake Hotspur himself.”
“I am like him in one particular, at all events,” was the reply, “for I cannot abide a coxcomb.”
“It strikes me, that is not the only point in which you resemble the ‘gunpowder Percy,’ as old Falstaff calls him. By the way,” he continued, “what in the world was the matter with ‘Aunt Sally,’ a minute ago she seems to go quietly enough now.”
“I rather fancy something must have hurt her mouth,” replied Harry, turning away his head to conceal a smile. As he spoke, they drove round the gravel sweep leading to the hall door of Hazlehurst Grange. Beneath the porch stood two gentlemen—in one of whom, corpulent and elderly, Coverdale had little trouble in recognising, from his likeness to his friend, Mr. Hazlehurst senior; while the other, tall, thin, and cadaverous-looking, he rightly conjectured to be the opulent and amorous cotton spinner, Jedediah Crane.