Now my idea was to make just as much love to Charlotte as would warn Miss Irma that she was in danger of losing me and to assist me in this (though I did not reveal my intention of merely baiting my trap with her) who more willing than Charlotte Anderson!
But I had counted without two somewhat important factors—Miss Irma, and Miss Seraphina Huntingdon. I was utterly deceived about the character of Irma, and I had no idea of the extreme notions of rigid propriety upon which Miss Seraphina conducted her business, nor of the explanation of the large proportion of successful weddings in which the lady mantua-maker had played the part of subordinate providence.
Indeed, certain of the light-minded youth of Eden Valley called the parlour with the faded red velvet chairs by the name of “Little Heaven”—because so many marriages had been made there.
CHAPTER XXVI
PERFIDY, THY NAME IS WOMAN!
Old Robert Anderson of Birkenbog was known to me by sight—a huge, jovial, two-ply man, chin and waistcoat alike testifying to good cheer. He wore a large horse-shoe pin in his unstiffened stock. A watch that needed an inch-thick chain to haul up its sturdy Nuremburg-egg build, strained the fob on his right side, as if he carried a mince-pie concealed there. His laugh dominated the market-place, and when he stood with his legs wide apart pouring a sample of oats slowly from one hand into the palm of the other, his red face with the cunning quirks in it had always a little gathering of admirers, eager for the next high-spiced tale. He had originally come from the English border, and in his “burr” and accent still bore token of that nationality.
Nevertheless, he had his admirers, some of them fervent as well as constant.
Cochrane of the Holm would be there, his hand on the shoulder of Blethering Johnny from the Dinnance. These two always laughed before a word was uttered. They thought Birkenbog so funny that everything he said was side-splitting even before he had said it.