“One has to be polite,” said Mr. Cole. “After all, he is our guest. Don’t forget that, my boy.”
“No, father. . . . I bet he was frightened at the burglar, father; more than you were.”
“Well, as a matter of fact, Jeremy, he was. I remember the incident perfectly. Percy hid in a cupboard. He’s forgotten that, I’ve no doubt.”
Father and son laughed.
“It would have to be a very large cupboard, father,” said Jeremy; and then they laughed again.
Here they were at the schools, where Mr. Cole was going to teach the little girls their Catechism. They parted, and Jeremy ran all the way down the hill home.
IV
Uncle Percy loved the world and desired that, in natural return, the world should love him. It seemed to him that the world did so. Once and again the net of his jollity and fun seemed to miss some straggling fish who gaped and then swam away, but he was of that happy temperament thus described by one of the most lovable of our modern poets:
“Who bears in mind misfortunes gone,
Must live in fear of more;