"Oh!" gasped Mrs. Cabell.
"It was silly, but I love it," added Eleanor; and David limped swiftly up the steps, and one heard Ebenezer, the butler, opening the door with suspicious promptness. Everyone in the house knew, mysteriously, that uncommon things were doing.
"Pendleton," spoke Mrs. Cabell, lying in wait for her son, the great doctor, as he came from his office at lunch time, "Pen, dear, let me tell you something extraordinary." She told, him, condensing as might be, and ended with; "And oh, Pen, he's the most adorable boy I ever saw. And so lonely and so poor and so plucky. Heartbroken because he's lame and can't serve. You'll cure him. Pen, dear, won't you, for his country?"
The tall, tired man bent down and kissed his mother. "Mummy, I'm not God Almighty. But I'll do my damdest for anything you want. Show me the paragon."
The paragon shot up, with the small unevenness which was his limp, and faced the big doctor on a level. The two pairs of eyes from their uncommon [pg 077] height, looked inquiringly into each other.
"I hear you have my name," spoke Dr. Cabell tersely.
"Yes, sir," said David, "And I'm glad." And the doctor knew that he also liked the paragon.
Lunch was an epic meal above and below stairs. Jeems had been fetched by that black Mercury Jackson, messenger today of the gods of joy. And the two old souls had been told by Mrs. Cabell that never again should they work hard or be anxious or want for anything. The sensation-loving colored servants rejoiced in the events as a personal jubilee, and made much of Aunt Basha and Unc' Jeems till their old heads reeled. Above stairs the scroll unrolled more or loss decorously, yet in magic colors unbelievable. Somehow David had told about Annesley and Jarvis last night.
"Somebody knitted him a whole dozen pairs of socks!" he commented, "Really she did. He said [pg 078] so. Think of a girl being as good to a chap as that."
"I'll knit you a dozen," Miss Eleanor Cabell capped his sentence, like the Amen at the end of a High Church prayer. "I'll begin this afternoon."