‘Connor, do you know, I have just discovered my mother! I have never known her till this summer.’
‘More fool you,’ I answered, for often had I, who had never known a mother, envied him his.
‘Yes, that is true,’ he answered slowly; ‘but you cannot see until you have eyes.’
Before he set out again for the west I gave him a supper, asking the men who had been with us in the old ‘Varsity days. I was doubtful as to the wisdom of this, and was persuaded only by Graeme’s eager assent to my proposal.
‘Certainly, let’s have them,’ he said; ‘I shall be awfully glad to see them; great stuff they were.’
‘But, I don’t know, Graeme; you see—well—hang it!—you know—you’re different, you know.’
He looked at me curiously.
‘I hope I can still stand a good supper, and if the boys can’t stand me, why, I can’t help it. I’ll do anything but roar, and don’t you begin to work off your menagerie act—now, you hear me!’
‘Well, it is rather hard lines that when I have been talking up my lion for a year, and then finally secure him, that he will not roar.’
‘Serve you right,’ he replied, quite heartlessly; ‘but I’ll tell you what I’ll do, I’ll feed! Don’t you worry,’ he adds soothingly; ‘the supper will go.’