Marie tossed her head and shrugged her shoulders when I insisted. “La, la!” she exclaimed, in her French way, “boys are so troublesome. Yes!”
Had it been any other servant, I should have said something sharp to her, in my newly acquired confidence. But she was mother’s maid, and it was no business of mine if she was impertinent.
“Well, mother,” I said, sitting down beside the bed and taking the hand she put out to me, “I hope you are better—the doctor says you are—and I hope you will forgive me for my part in the disgraceful scene we had down stairs last night. But I couldn’t stand those Downeses any more and that’s a fact!”
“Oh, Clinton! My dear boy! you are so impulsive and tempestuous,” she murmured.
“I’ll try to be as meek as Moses—a regular pussy cat around the house, hereafter,” I returned, cheerfully.
“You are just like your father,” she sighed.
“I’m proud to hear you say it,” I returned, promptly. “For all I have ever heard about my father—save the hints that those two scoundrels have dropped—makes me believe that father was a man worthy of copying in every particular.”
Mother squeezed my hand convulsively, exclaiming:
“Clinton! Clinton! You must not say such things.”
“Pray tell me why not, mother?” I demanded, but I spoke quietly. “I won’t say a word about Mr. Chester Downes and Paul, if it hurts your feelings for me to tell the truth about them. But I am bound to be angry if anybody maligns my father’s memory.”