"I'm readin'," said William, with icy dignity.
"Dear boy! Won't you come and show me the garden and your favourite nooks and corners?"
William looked at her thin, vague, amiable face, and shut his book with a resigned sigh.
"All right," he said, laconically.
He conducted her in patient silence round the kitchen garden and the shrubbery. She looked sadly at the house, with its red brick, uncompromisingly-modern appearance.
"William, I wish your house was old," she said, sadly.
William resented any aspersions on his house from outsiders. Personally he considered newness in a house an attraction, but, if anyone wished for age, then old his house should be.
"Old!" he ejaculated. "Huh! I guess it's old enough."
"Oh, is it?" she said, delighted. "Restored recently, I suppose?"
"Umph," agreed William, nodding.