“Then he bowed to you, Mary,” said Miss Sally, and, as Mary blushed, young Perivale ground his heel into a dandelion.
“I don’t wonder,” said this youth, whose complaint was not hard to diagnose; but the compliment was ignored by the Misses Wake.
“Whatever makes him play village cricket? Why, his lordship never does, nor the Rector—and Mr. Germain could buy up the pair of them, I hear. Don’t you call it singular, Mr. Perivale? I do.”
“Doesn’t make much of it, does he?” says Perivale, drily.
“No, certainly not. Why should he? An old gentleman like that!”
Friendship required a protest, and so Miss Kitty cried, “Oh, Sally, he’s not a bit old!” Mary’s corroboration being called for, she said that she should not call him old.
“Well, whatever he is, he’s very polite. That bow of his! My dear, you might have been Miss de Speyne! However did he know it was you, at this distance?”
“Perhaps he took his hat off to you, Sally,” Mary said, but Miss Sally would have none of that.
“He looks straight at you, as if he knew you by heart, and then stiffens himself, and off with his hat. Cricket! He’s no cricketer—but he’s a gentleman.”
So much all must admit. Mary, mildly elated, had no objection to further inquiries. The former encounter, Mr. Germain’s deliberate advance into the school-treat: these wonders were revealed, rolled on the tongue, absorbed. Young Mr. Perivale took a stroll and fiercely, in the course of it, asked a small boy what he was looking at, hey? But more wonders were to come. Mr. Germain refreshed himself with the players, during the tea interval, introduced himself to Mr. Nunn, of The Sanctuary, patted the heads of his brood, and meeting Miss Middleham by the trestle-table, shook hands with her and held her in talk. He deprecated his cricket with simplicity. “I reflect that it is five-and-twenty years since I chased a cricket ball; but you may see the force of your example, Miss Middleham. Had you not inspired me to effort the other day I should hardly have embarked upon to-day’s adventure.”