"No—to-morrow!" pronounced Hugh John. "She ought to have the night to think it over. It wouldn't be fair unless!"
"No more it would, young fellow!" cried Butcher Donnan, clapping Hugh John on the shoulder. "You found us a new business. You are finding us a daughter—perhaps some day——"
"Hush now, Butcher," said his wife, anxious as to what he should say next.
But Hugh John, already deep in his mission, took no offense at Butcher Donnan's innuendoes. Elizabeth Fortinbras and he were the best of good friends. And when the time came he would stand by the right hand of the bridegroom of her choice and witness his joy.
So at least he thought at that moment.
XVII
THE LITTLE GREEN MAN
Written the Summer we went abroad for the first time.
It was about then that Hugh John suddenly grew up. He had been threatening it for a long time, but had always put it off. This time, however, it was for keeps. We noticed it first when we made Father tell us stories. Hugh John had grown tired of the "Little Green Man"! Now this was a thing so terrible to us that we hardly dared to face it. For, you see, we had been, as it were, brought up on the Little Green Man, and this was like being false to the very salt we had eaten. And the crime was specially bad on Hugh John's part. For, you see, he ate such a lot of salt that the Doctor told him it was bad for his health. However, because there is no chance of Hugh John reading this book, I will try to tell the tale just as Father tells it even yet to Margaret the Maid—and the rest of us who have not grown too old to like such stories.