But young Tay answered indifferently: “Oh, we’ve plenty of those at home. The bald heads always make the worst fools of themselves. But I mean to have a real romance in my life and stick to it. Shall only have time for one, as when once I put on the harness I mean to keep it on. I’m going to be one of the biggest millionnaires in the United States. Say, what made you marry so young? You don’t look more than sixteen.”
“I’m nineteen,” replied Julia, haughtily.
“Well, don’t get huffy. You ought to see how extra sweet Cherry looks when some one tells her she looks ten years younger than she is —”
“So does Aunt Maria!” Julia laughed again. “Fancy a boy like you noticing such things.”
“I’m fifteen, not so young for a man, particularly when he’s been brought up in a family of women. He gets on to all their curves—I tell you what! And I can tell you that many an American boy of fifteen is supporting his mother—whole family.”
“You don’t mean it!”
“I do. It’s not so easy, but it’s done every day. I don’t pretend there are not lots that let their sisters work, but that’s either because they can’t get along, no matter how hard they try, or because there’s a screw loose—foreign blood, most likely. No real American would do it. If pa died to-morrow, I’d quit school and go right into the firm. Nobody’d get the best of me, neither.”
It was impossible to resist such firm self-confidence. Julia looked at him in open admiration.
“Say!” he exclaimed, with one of his dazzling leaps among the peaks of conversation. “Would you mind letting your hair down?”
“Why—What?”