"Well, this can make him prouder than ever," I put in. "He can be proud that his son is chosen to have this scholarship because of his being the nice Southern gentleman he is."
By this time Louis could command his voice, and he said:
"I can hardly tell you, sir, how much I appreciate the interest you have shown in me and your kindness in making this offer, and I hope to be able to accept it. I wish it might have been because of something I am in myself, and not just because I am the descendant of gentlemen."
"But you are what you are partly because of that descent," I insisted. "Persons of low extraction accomplish something in spite of it sometimes; but I must say it is pleasant to have scholarships thrust upon one because of being a Southern gentleman. I think in this day and generation our ancestors do precious little for us—just sit back in their gilt frames and make us uncomfortable—I am glad for some of them to be getting to work."
Louis laughed and said he didn't know but that I was right. We all of us wanted to hear more of Exmoor, and Professor Green told us it was a small college, quite old and of excellent standing among educators, and that it was in walking distance of Wellington, where he occupied the chair of English. It turned out, however, that the professor was a great walker, and that Exmoor and Wellington were more than ten miles apart.
"Exmoor has a very fine course in agriculture and one of the greatest landscape gardeners in the United States is a graduate of that college, and boasts that he got his start there."
"Oh, Louis, that will be splendid, and you can specialize in that and come back to Charleston and do all the things you dream of doing!" exclaimed Dee, who still had Louis by the hand but was totally oblivious of the fact.
She was so excited over the offer Professor Green had made her friend that she might even have hugged him without knowing she was doing it. Louis was not quite so unconscious as Dee, but was making the best of his opportunity. Dee's attitude toward Louis was very much one that she had toward Oliver, the kitten she saved from drowning our first year at boarding-school, a purely maternal feeling, looking upon herself as his protector and elderly friend (being about two years his junior). Louis, however, was tumbling head over heels in love with her, as Dum and I could plainly see. There had not been many meetings, but when there were he stuck much closer than a brother to her side.
Claire could see it as plainly as we could, and no doubt went through all the heartaches an only sister would. She evidently liked Dee very much, however, and was willing to efface herself completely if it would make Louis happy. But Dee would have been quite as astonished if the kitten, Oliver, had stood up on his hind legs and sworn undying love for her; or Pharaoh's daughter, if the infant Moses had burst forth in amorous rhapsodies from his wicker basket after she had saved him from the waters of the Nile. She dropped his hand to pick up Grimalkin, and I am sure at the time she had no more sensations about the one than the other.
"If I might advise you young people," said Professor Green, "I think it will be just as well to say nothing to your father yet about the scholarship, but wait and Mr. Tucker and I will formally suggest it to him and ask his permission."