"I guess I'm old enough to take care of myself! I ain't a baby," replied Felix indignantly.
As the hack had just driven up to the door, and there was no time to spare, Mr. Le Bras shook hands all around, kissed Mrs. Le Bras and the children, said he wished he was a German so that he could kiss his brother too, as the gentlemen kissed each other in Germany, added at the last, "Now, you make that boy mind, at all costs," sprang into the carriage, told the driver to hurry, and rode off, while Felix shouted after him,—
"Don't you forget, father, that I can take care of myself!"
Johnny and Sue then took Felix up to see his room, for he had not visited them since they had moved into their new house. It was a very pretty room, fourteen feet square, in the L over the kitchen, and had a charming view of the yard and the park beyond. It was Sue's room, but she was to sleep on a cot-bed in her mother's room while Felix staid; and she rather liked the change, because her mother's room looked out on the street, where she could see the passers-by.
Johnny's room was over the dining-room, and so next to Felix's, but only opened into the hall. The spare chamber was over the sitting-room.
"This will pass," said Felix, when Johnny and Sue called his attention to the various good points about the room. "It is about half as large as my room at home; but I don't care for that, nor that there isn't any bath-room or dressing-room out of it, 'cause I sha'n't be in my room but precious little, and I mean to go down to the river and bathe every day,—swim, I mean. I can swim like a fish,—since we've had our cottage down by the shore: I learned last season. By the way, father says we can all go down to the cottage if we want to: it's furnished, you know, and empty."
"Oh, I wish we could!" said Sue. "I'll go and ask mamma if we are going."
Sue ran off, while Felix opened his trunk and showed Johnny his new summer clothes, which were very fine; also his jointed fishing-rod and various other boyish possessions, which were recent acquisitions of which he had not yet tired, since they were all fresh from the stores, most of them being presents his mother had given him to reconcile him for being deprived of a voyage to Europe.
Presently Sue came back, saying it was not decided about the offer of the cottage being accepted: it depended upon whether her father could get away for a long vacation, for her mother said she should not go unless he was able to go too.
"But I shouldn't wonder if we did go," added Sue hopefully; "for mamma looked as though she rather thought father would be able to get away, and she said he could tell better in a few weeks."