“I must say I like his persistence!” exclaimed the young fellow, turning again to the table. “In America I should call him out and punch his head, but over here—”
“Over here you have better manners,” replied the girl, laughing. “But why trouble yourself? He doesn’t even look at us. We are of no importance to him whatever. We probably speak a different language.”
“But he travels by the same trains; he stops at the same inns; he sits near us at the theater—he even affects the same pictures in the same galleries! It’s growing a trifle monotonous; it’s really insufferable. I think I shall have to try my stick on him.”
“You flatter yourself, Richard,” mocked the girl. “He’s fully your height and a trifle broader across the shoulders. The lines about his mouth are almost—yes, I should say, quite as firm as yours, though he is a younger man. His eyes are nice blue ones, and they are very steady. His hair is”—she paused to reflect and tilted her head slightly, her eyes wandering for an instant to the subject of her comment—“light brown, I should call it. And he is beardless, as all self-respecting men should be. I’m sure that he is an exemplary person—kind to his sisters and aunts, very willing to sacrifice himself for others and light the candles on his nephews’ and nieces’ Christmas trees.”
She rested her cheek against her lightly-clasped hands and sighed deeply to provoke a continuation of her brother’s growling disdain.
The young gentleman to whom she had referred had seated himself at a table not far distant, given an order with some particularity, and settled himself to the reading of a newspaper which he had drawn from the pocket of his blue serge coat. He was at once absorbed, and the presence of the Claibornes gave him apparently not the slightest concern.
“He has a sense of humor,” the girl resumed. “I saw him yesterday—”
“You’re always seeing him: you ought to be ashamed of yourself.”
“Don’t interrupt me, please. As I was saying, I saw him laughing over the Fliegende Blätter.”
“But that’s no sign he has a sense of humor. It rather proves that he hasn’t. I’m disappointed in you, Shirley. To think that my own sister should be able to tell the color of a wandering blackguard’s eyes!”