“Yes. I seem to have met the market for excitement.”
By this time they had reached the large living-room, where they found Mrs. Johnston presiding with ill-directed advice over the struggles of her grey-bearded husband to insert himself into a pair of boots of insufficient calibre.
“Twenty-five years o’ service in the life-savin’ corps an’ ain’t let to go out now without these der-r-r-ratted contraptions!” he fumed.
A splendid, tawny-haired girl in an oilskin jacket stood looking out into the night, her eyes vivid with a brooding excitement. She turned as Haynes came in.
“Are you ready, Petit Père? I’m smothering in these things.”
Expressively she passed her hands down along the oilskins, which covered her dress without concealing the sumptuous beauty of her young figure.
Filled as was Colton’s mind with the image of another face, he looked at her with astonished admiration. Such, thought he, must have been the superb maids in whose inspiration the Vikings fought and conquered.
“If you knew what a gallant wet-weather figure you make,” Haynes answered her (Colton wondered how he could ever have thought the face disagreeable, so complete was the change of expression), “your vanity would keep you comfortable.”
“Dinna blether,” returned the girl, smiling with affectionate comradeship, and slipping her arm through his to draw him to the door. “Father’s boots are on at last.”
“We’re to have company,” said Haynes. “Mr. Colton—I think you said your name was Colton—wants to come along.”