"Eh, what?" grunted the General, light beginning to dawn upon him. "Do you mean Mr. Keane? Hum! how's one to be up to all your confounded slang? How could I know? Devil take you, Sydie, why can't you write common English? You young fellows talk as bad jargon as Sepoys. You're sure I'm delighted to see you, Mr. Keane, though I did make the mistake."
"Thank you, General," said Keane; "but it's rather cool of you, Master Sydie, to have forced me on to your uncle's hands without his wish or his leave."
"Not at all, not at all," swore the General, with vehement cordiality. "I gave him carte blanche to ask whom he would, and unexpected guests are always most welcome; not that you were unexpected though, for I'd told that boy to be sure and bring somebody down here——"
"And have had the tax-cart and my phaeton turned out to make comfortable quarters for him," said Miss Fay, with a glance at The Coach to see how he took chaff, "and I only hope Mr. Keane may like his accommodation."
"Perhaps, Miss Morton," said Keane, smiling, "I shall like it so well that you will have to say to me as poor Voltaire to his troublesome abbé, 'Don Quichotte prenait les auberges pour les châteaux, mais vous avez pris les châteaux pour les auberges.'"
"Tiresome man," thought Fay. "I wish Sydie hadn't brought him here; but I shall do as I always do, however grand and supercilious he may look. He has lived among all those men and books till he has grown as cold as granite. What a pity it is people don't enjoy existence as I do!"
"You are thinking, Miss Morton," said Keane, as he walked on beside her, with an amused glance at her face, which was expressive enough of her thoughts, "that if your uncle is glad to see me, you are not, and that Sydie was very stupid not to bring down one of his kindred spirits instead of——Don't disclaim it now; you should veil your face if you wish your thoughts not to be read."
"I was not going to disclaim it," said Fay, quickly looking up at him with a rapid glance, half penitence, half irritation. "I always tell the truth; but I was not thinking exactly that; I don't want any of Sydie's friends—I detest boys—but I certainly was thinking that as you look down on everything that we all delight in, I fancied you and the Beeches will hardly agree. If I am rude, you must not be angry; you wanted me to tell you the truth."
Keane smiled again.
"Do I look down on the things you delight in? I hardly know enough of you, as we have only addressed about six syllables to each other, to be able to judge what you like and what you don't like; but certainly I must admit, that caressing the little round heads of those puppies yonder, which seemed to afford you such extreme rapture, would not be any source of remarkable gratification to me."