“Then thanksgiving after the ham would be perfectly proper!”
Miss Osborne was studying Griswold carefully, then she laughed, and her attitude toward him, that had been tempered by a certain official reserve, became at once cordial.
“Are you the Professor Griswold who is so crazy about pirates? I’ve heard the Wilsons speak of you, but you don’t look like that.”
“Don’t I look like a pirate? Thank you! I had an appointment at Judge Wilson’s office this morning to talk over a case in which I’m interested.”
“I remember now what he said about you. He said you really were a fine lawyer, but that you liked to read about pirates.”
“That may have been what he said to you; but he has told me that the association of piracy and law was most unfortunate, as it would suggest unpleasant comments to those who don’t admire the legal profession.”
“And you are one of those tide-water Griswolds, then, if you know the Randolph Wilsons. They are very strong for the tide-water families; to hear them talk you’d think the people back in the Virginia hills weren’t really respectable.”
“It’s undeniably the right view of the matter,” laughed Griswold, “but now that I live in Charlottesville I don’t insist on it. It wouldn’t be decent in me. And I have lots of cousins in Lexington and through the Valley. The broad view is that every inch of the Old Dominion is holy ground.”
“It is an interesting commonwealth, Mr. Griswold; but I do not consider it holy ground. South Carolina has a monopoly of that;” and then the smile left her face and she returned to the telegram. “Our immediate business, however, is not with Virginia, or with South Carolina, but with the miserable commonwealth that lies between.”
“And that commonwealth,” said Griswold, wishing to prolong the respite from official cares, “that state known in law and history as North Carolina, I have heard called, by a delightful North Carolina lady I met once at Charlottesville, a valley of humility between two mountains of conceit. That seems to hit both of us!”