"Oh, yes; compressed meats of some kind, I suppose. But I don't think I care about slang very much."
"You may be sure you will when you get over the defects of your Keeton bringing up. But what was I going to tell you? Let me see. Oh, yes, about my brother and his wife. The honest Keeton folks seem to have forgotten them. But I was speaking, too, about my going to see my brother in town. Oh, yes, I went to see him; he didn't want me, and he made no bones about letting me know it. He thinks I have disgraced the family; it was quite like the scene in the play—whose play is it?—I am sure I don't remember—where Lord Foppington's brother goes to see him, and is taken so coolly. I haven't read the play for more years than you have lived in the world, I dare say, but it all came back upon me in a moment. I felt like saying, 'Good-by, Foppington,' only that he would never have understood the allusion, and would think I meant to say he was a 'fop,' which he is not, bless him."
"Then your visit did not bring you any nearer to a reconciliation with your brother?"
"Not a bit of it—pushed us further asunder, I think. The odd thing was that I told him I wanted nothing from him, and that I had made money enough for myself in the West. You would have thought that would have fetched him, wouldn't you? Not the least in life, I give you my word." And Mr. St. Paul laughed good-humoredly at the idea.
"I am sorry to hear it," said Minola. "I think there are quarrels and spites enough in the world, without brothers joining in with all the rest."
"Bad form, isn't it—don't you think? But I don't suppose in real life brothers and sisters ever do care much for each other—do you think they do? I haven't known any such cases—have you?"
Minola could not contribute much from her own family history to demonstrate the affection and devotion of brothers, but she had no idea of agreeing in the truth of Mr. St. Paul's philosophic reflections for all that.
"I believe what you say is true enough as regards the brothers, but I can't admit it of the sisters."
"Come now, you don't really believe that nonsense, I know."
"Believe what nonsense? That sisters may be fond of their brothers sometimes?"