'Shall I bring him up?' I asked.
Rising from the sofa, and laying down the newspaper which she had been reading, Aunt Marion walked towards the door. She must have been near her thirty-fifth year at that time, about the same age as our visitor. She was tall, fair, and nice-looking, good-tempered, and perhaps a little careless. That morning she was wearing a light blue dressing-gown, although it was past eleven o'clock.
'Yes, bring Captain Knowlton up,' she answered, and ask him to wait a few minutes.'
As she went to the bedroom, I returned to the street door, where Captain Knowlton stood gazing at Jane as she continued to smack the oilcloth with her wet flannel.
'You are to come upstairs,' I cried, and following me to the sitting-room, he sat down and began to stare afresh.
'So you are poor Frank Everard's boy!' he said.
'Did you know my father?' I demanded, for I had no recollection of either parent, or of any relative with the exception of Aunt Marion, under whose charge I had moved about from lodging-house to lodging-house since I was four years of age.
'Well,' said Captain Knowlton, 'if I had not known him, I should not be here to-day.'
He became silent for a few moments, and then added, as he took my hand and drew me against his knee, 'Your father once saved my life, Jack. How old are you?' he asked.
'Eleven next month,' I replied, and, somewhat to my disappointment, Aunt Marion entered the room as I spoke, wearing the dress in which she went to church on Sundays.