"Oh, no, you wouldn't. Suppose, say, that some very charming and delightful youth appeared who took up all your attention, and suddenly I came back to find you giving a grand party in the garden."
"Aunt would never permit it for one minute," she cried, aghast.
"But we must eliminate aunt; Haidée, so far as we know, had no wise and excellent aunt to look after her. Let me see. Oh, yes! Suppose I came back and found this festivity going on, the agreeable youth acting as host, and you, my dear, entirely absorbed in him, and the whole house upside down. Would you expect me to feel very amiable?"
Jane-Anne gazed earnestly at Mr. Wycherly. The gentle, high-bred face was quite grave, though persons better versed than Jane-Anne in subtleties of expression might have noted a look of considerable amusement in his handsome eyes.
"But Haidée's father wasn't a bit like you," she objected. "He was a cruel pirate."
"Even pirates have their parental feelings," he pleaded.
Jane-Anne looked much perturbed.
"It sounds horrid said like that," she murmured sadly; "but it's beautiful in the poetry book."
"How much have you read?" asked Mr. Wycherly.
"Only to where poor, pretty Haidée dies. I don't read very fast, you know—not like you, sir, and Master Montagu; and when I like a bit I read it over and over again."