“You are a college graduate?”

“Wellesley.”

“You have taught before?”

“I tutored a girl throughout a whole summer.  Prepared her for her college entrance exams.”

“She passed creditably?”

“She wasn’t conditioned in anything.”

“How are you on discipline?”

“I don’t know.”

“You have had no experience?  Never tried your hand at training a boy, for example?”

Claire’s blue-gray eyes grew suddenly audacious, and the bridge of her short nose wrinkled up delightfully in a roguish smile.

“I trained my father.  He was a dear old boy—­the dearest in the world.  He used to say he had never been brought up, until I came along.  He used to say I ruled him with a rod of iron.  But he was very well-behaved before I got through with him.  He was quite a model boy, really.”

Glancing quickly up into the steadfast eyes that had, at first, seemed to her so stern as to be almost forbidding, she met an expression so mild, so full of winning kindness, that she suddenly remembered and understood what Martha had meant when she said once:  “A body wouldn’t call the queen her cousin when he looks at you like that!”

“Your father was a credit to your bringing-up, certainly.  I never had the honor of meeting Judge Lang, but I knew him by reputation.  I remember to have heard some one say of him once—­’He was a judge after Socrates’ own heart.  He heard courteously, he answered wisely, he considered soberly, he decided impartially.  Added to this, he was one whom kings could not corrupt.’  That is an enviable record.”

Claire’s eyes filled with grateful moisture, but she did not allow them to overflow.  She nodded rapidly once or twice in a quaint, characteristic little fashion, and then sat silent, examining the links in her silver-meshed purse, with elaborate attention.

“Perhaps Mrs. Slawson has told you that my young nephew is something of a pickle.”

The question restored Claire at once.  “I’m fond of pickles.”

“Good!  I believe there are said to be fifty-eight varieties.  Are you prepared to smack your lips over him, whichever he may be?”

“Well, if I can’t smack my lips, there’s always the alternative of smacking him.”

Mr. Ronald laughed.  “Not allowed,” he announced regretfully.  “My sister won’t have it.  Radcliffe is to be guided ‘by love alone.’”

“Whose love, please?  His or mine?”

Again Mr. Ronald laughed.  “Now you’ve got me!” he admitted.  “Perhaps a little of both.  Do you think you could supply your share?  I have no doubt of your being able to secure his.”

“I like children.  We’ve always managed to hit it off pretty well, the kiddies and I, but, of course, I can’t guarantee anything definite in connection with your little boy, because, you see, I’ve never been a governess before.  I’ve only had to do with youngsters who’ve come a-visiting, or else the small, lower East-siders at the Settlement.  But I’ll promise to do my best.”