“It would be more scholardy,” Daniel admitted.
Will proffered a conclusive hand. “Then it’s a bargain!” But Daniel let the hand hover.
“Oi don’t droive much meself nowadays,” he repeated with anxious honesty.
“We don’t expect it of the head of the firm,” said Will grandly; “there’s substitutes and subordinates.” But his hand drooped with a sense of bathos.
“Ay,” said the old man, swelling, “subordinators and granddarters.” He fished for the hand.
“Oughtn’t we to let ’em know?” Will insinuated.
“Oi allus liked young Flynt, your father,” answered the Gaffer, squeezing his fingers heartily. “And there warn’t much amiss with your mother. A forthright family, aldoe Peculiar. Jinny droives a-Sundays to chapel with the buoy-oys!”
At which sudden failure—or rather resurgence—of memory, Will felt more urgently than ever the need of getting Jinny’s consent rather than the nonagenarian’s.
“You’re mighty lucky,” he said craftily, “to have a granddaughter so spry. I reckon we’d better have her down and tell her.”
“Ay, that Oi be,” replied the Gaffer. “ ’Tis heartenin’ to hear her singin’ up and down the house.”