"Ruins!"—and, indeed, I was not yet twenty-six,—"I am a comparatively young man."
As a concession, "In consideration of your past, you are tolerably well preserved."
"—and I am not a new brand of marmalade, either."
"No, for that comes in glass jars; whereas, Mr. Townsend, I have heard, is more apt to figure in family ones."
"A pun, Miss Beechinor, is the base coinage of conversation tendered only by the mentally dishonest."
"—Besides, one can never have enough of marmalade."
"I trust they give you a sufficiency of it in the nursery?"
"Dear me, you have no idea how admirably that paternal tone sits upon you! You would make an excellent father, Mr. Townsend. You really ought to adopt someone. I wish you would adopt me, Mr. Townsend."
I said I had other plans for her. Discreetly, she forbore to ask what they were.
5