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"Didn't you ever hear the name Irving before?" The boy's face brightened up suddenly. "That was my papa's name," he said eagerly. "Now, I want to ask you an important question," said Miss Ladd impressively. "Try your best to tell us all you can, and don't tell any of the Grahams you were down here talking to us. We won't forget you. If they beat you any more come, and tell us if you can get away.
She gloried in the pride which he manifested in her success at school, in her budding beauty and graceful ways. She welcomed his coming with infinite delight, and was ever ready to drop any other project when papa's brief letters and telegrams summoned her to the city.
"Papa always said I was bright as a button; so mama always called me Button-Bright," he said. "What is your papa's name?" "Just Papa." "What else?" "Don't know." "Never mind," said the shaggy man, smiling. "We'll call the boy Button-Bright, as his mama does. That name is as good as any, and better than some." Dorothy watched the boy dig. "Where do you live?" she asked.
"My dear," said she, as she gave him a confiding look, which haunts Delancey yet, "this is a great friend of Papa's, and an old playmate of mine Mr. Delancey;" and as the stranger stepped forward to shake his hand, Blanche looked at her old lover, with a glance that seemed to say, "How foolish were we, to deem we were ever more than friends."
"You see, mamma dear," pleaded Matilda, who saw that her parent remained unaffected, "it isn't as if Leander was in poor papa's profession." "I hope, Matilda," said the lady sharply, "you are not going to pain me again by mentioning this young man and your departed father in the same breath, because I cannot bear it." "The old lady," reflected Leander here, "don't seem to take to me!"
Sebastian's fifteen years ago, by way of envelope for 'pussy, and which, to the best of pussy's knowledge, was the one sole memorandum of papa ever heard of at St. Sebastian's. Pussy, however, saw no use in revising and correcting the text of papa's remembrances. She showed her usual prudence, and her usual incomparable decision.
"It's a horrid bore being shut up here," he admitted frankly, "but papa might return while we were out, and I'm not sure that he would like to find us away. I wish I could think of some way to amuse you. Oh, I know we were talking about barristers' robes the other day; I'll show you papa's gown and wig. I know where Jarvis keeps them. Wouldn't you like to see them?"
The extract tells all that need be known, for the purpose I have in view, of the miserable pair to whom it relates. "You remember Mr. and Mrs. ? Mrs. came here the other day, with a most melancholy tale of her wretched husband's drunken, extravagant, profligate habits. She asked Papa's advice; there was nothing she said but ruin before them. They owed debts which they could never pay.
This is one of your father's hunters I am riding, is it not?" "Yes, and a grand jumper he is too: accustomed to papa's weight, carrying you will be quite play to him."
"But have you not got a guardian or something?" "Not exactly. Only an old lawyer person who is now in London. I have seen Papa's will, and I know I can marry when and whom I like if I get his consent and he would give it in a minute, he is sick of me!" "How fortunate!" Then restlessness seized him again, and he got up, gulped down his tea, and began his pacing.
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