It could not have been malice—it certainly must have been want of thought—that induced Aunt Martha to break the temporary silence with the remark, addressed to the Colonel:
"It is a funny question I am going to ask, I know, Colonel, but I suppose I have an old woman's privilege. Mrs. Owen and myself were talking about ages a day or two ago, and she thought you were more than thirty-five. How old are you?"
If half a paper of pins, with all the points upward, had suddenly made their appearance in the bottom of the Colonel's chair, he probably could not have been more discomfited. What reason he had to be unquiet, will be more apparent at a later period. He fidgetted a little and hemmed more than once, before he replied:
"Humph! hum! Well, Madame, to tell you the truth, I am a little on the shady side of extreme youth—old enough to be through with my juvenile indiscretions—ha! ha!" (The laugh decidedly forced and feeble). "I am a little over thirty-two—was thirty-two in March last."
"I thought so! I was sure you could not be older than that!" said Aunt Martha, in the most natural way in the world, while Emily took a quick look round at the Colonel, which said, much plainer than words: "Oh, what a bouncer!"
"No, Madame," added the Colonel, perhaps aware that fibs require to be told over at least twice before they acquire the weight of truths told once. "No, Madame, a fraction over thirty-two, as I said."
At that moment the invisible influences, if they have good ears, may have heard Frank Wallace getting up from his chair, and muttering between his teeth something very like:
"Humph! well, I cannot stand this any longer! If I do not succeed in making the house too warm to hold that respectable individual, within ten minutes, I shall certainly leave it myself!" Just then the words "thirty-two," from the Colonel's lips, met his ear, and though he did not catch the context, so as to know what it was all about, the spirit of malicious (and it must be said, reckless) mischief, prompted him to lounge leisurely forward and take a share in the conversation, although uninvited.
"Ah, Colonel, did I understand you to say thirty-two?"
"Yes, I said thirty-two!" said the personage addressed, with a stiffness contrasting very forcibly with the suavity of his speech to Aunt Martha. Emily, who, as may be supposed, knew Frank Wallace better than any other person in the house, at that moment caught a glimpse of his face under the chandelier, and saw that trouble was brewing. The sulk had gone, and the badger, a much more dangerous devil in society, had taken its place. Two antagonistic acids were certainly coming together, and an explosion was very likely to be the result. Yet what could the poor girl do, except to wait the crash and be ready to act as peacemaker when the worst came to the worst? The one thing she would have liked to do, was precisely the thing she dared not do for her life—that was, to spring up, catch her young lover by the arm, drag him out into the garden, pet him a good deal and kiss him a very little, and send him home doubtful whether he was walking on his head or his heels—while her old beau might spend the whole evening, if he liked, with Aunt Martha. Millie would give her bright eyes to be able to do the same thing with Tom, stately Madame mere, when all she dares do in your presence is to sit still, answer in monosyllables, steal sly glances when you are not looking, and be generally dull and stupid. Would it not be well to let them out occasionally, Madame mere, for half an hour's play, with full consent and confidence, as they let out the colts in the country? Who knows but they might behave the better for it, when out of your sight altogether? Think of it, Madame mere, and make public the result of your experiment! But all this is grossly irrelevant, and springs out of the fact that Emily, who wished to drag Frank Wallace out of the danger of an approaching melée, had not the power to do so.