"No, I'll try not to—you don't think you'd better go to bed, do you?"
"I do not!"
And he took the situation into his own hands and showed Aunt Jane through the house; and she admired it all, and liked the flowers growing in little pots in the drawing-room windows.
"This would be a good place to have your tea," she remarked.
"We are going outdoors," he said obstinately—and there was a long, low rumble somewhere— "What's that?" He had started.
"Sounds like thunder," said Aunt Jane. She moved over to the window. "Yes—looks as if we were going to have a shower—a hard one. I thought I felt like it." She sat down placidly.
Lightning played through the room, with fantastic touches on the chairs and tables and on the little growing plants in the windows.
"I guess we'll have tea indoors." She beamed on him.
He laughed out with vexation and rang the bell and ordered tea and had a fire made on the great open hearth. He drew up a chair before it for Aunt Jane and made her comfortable.