"Ah, now I place him. He was head of Flower da Hundred at the time of the massacre, and since has risen to be a member of the Virginia House of Burgesses. I would like to speak with this young man. Is that his knock at the door?"
"I—I think it may be," hesitated Peggy. "He brought a letter from his mother to my aunt, who knew her in their youth at home in Devonshire."
Hard upon her remarks a young man entered the room, and stood hesitating in the doorway as if loath to venture further without assurance of welcome.
He was a colty youth, with long legs and slim body, and hands and feet that had not learned the repose of maturity. He had also a shock of dark curls, and under arching brows a pair of merry blue eyes that danced when anything pleased him beyond the common, like the sun on Easter morning, while under their surface mirth lay steadfast depths which bade fair to endure when their dancing days were over.
Just now there was more of anxiety than mirth in them as they turned toward the slip of a girl by the hearth, as timid a glance as if she were the Shah of Persia and he a humble subject in terror of the bowstring.
"Come in!" vouchsafed Peggy,—but with some impatience in her voice, for she had not yet begun on the list of questions she had prepared for her other visitor.
"Governor Brent, this is Master Romney Huntoon. Master Huntoon, I have the honor to present you to Governor Brent." Both men bowed, the younger man lower.
"I fancy," said Brent, "that I am not wrong in taking you for the son of that Humphrey Huntoon whose good repute has travelled beyond the limits of his own province, and become familiar to us dwellers across the borders."
Romney Huntoon blushed with pleasure and secretly treasured up the words to say over to his mother; but he received them with some discomposure. To tell the truth, it is not an easy matter to meet a compliment for one's relative; the disclaimers wherewith a man may receive such for himself not quite fitting the situation, yet consanguinity seeming to demand a corresponding degree of modesty.
"My father will feel deeply honored," he murmured, and lost the end he had fashioned for his speech in watching a curl that had fallen forward over Peggy Neville's ear.