"You must keep the peace," Joanna put in addressing her husband; and before Rufinus could retort, Paula had asked him with frank simplicity:
"How old are you, my worthy host?"
"Your arrival at my house blessed the second day of my seventieth year," replied Rufinus with a courteous bow. His wife shook her finger at him, exclaiming:
"I wonder whether you have not a secret hump? Such fine phrases. . ."
"He is catching the style from his cripples," said Paula laughing at him. "But now it is your turn, friend Philippus. Your exposition was worthy of an antique sage, and it struck me—for the sake of Rufinus here I will not say convinced me. I respect you—and yet I should like to know how old. . . ."
"I shall soon be thirty-one," said Philippus, anticipating her question.
"That is an honest answer," observed Dame Joanna. "At your age many a man clings to his twenties."
"Why?" asked Pulcheria.
"Well," said her mother, "only because there are some girls who think a man of thirty too old to be attractive."
"Stupid creatures," answered Pulcheria. "Let them find me a young man who is more lovable than my father; and if Philippus—yes you, Philippus—were ten or twenty years over nine and twenty, would that make you less clever or kind?"