“Now look here, auntie,” said Austin, sitting bolt upright.  “Let him call, by all means, and see how well you look after being deserted for five-and-twenty years; but I don’t want a step-uncle, and you are not to give me one.  Fancy me with an Uncle Charlotte!  That wouldn’t do, you know.  You won’t give me a step-uncle, will you?  Please!”

“Don’t be absurd, my dear; and do, for goodness’ sake, keep that dreadful leg of yours quiet if you can.  It always gives me the jumps when you go on jerking it about like that.  Of course I should never dream of marrying now; but I confess I do feel a little curious to see what my old friend looks like after all these years——­”

“Your old admirer, you mean,” interpolated Austin.  “To think of your having had a romance!  You can’t throw stones at Lady Merthyr Tydvil now, you know.  I believe you’re a regular flirt, auntie, I do indeed.  This poor young man now; you say he disappeared, but I believe you simply drove him away in despair by your cruelty.  Were you a ’cruel maid’ like the young women one reads about in poetry-books?  Oh, auntie, auntie, I shall never have faith in you again.”

“You’re a very disrespectful boy, that’s what you are,” retorted Aunt Charlotte, turning as pink as her ribbons.  “The gentleman we’re speaking of must be quite elderly, several years older than I am, and, for all I know, he may have a wife and half-a-dozen grown-up children by this time.  You let your tongue wag a very great deal too fast, I can tell you, Austin.”

“But what’s his name?” asked Austin, not in the least abashed.  “We can’t go on for ever referring to him as ‘the gentleman,’ as though there were no other gentlemen in the world, can we now?”

“His name is Ogilvie—­Mr Granville Ogilvie,” replied his aunt.  “He belongs to a very fine old family in the north.  There have been Ogilvies distinguished in many ways—­in literature, in the services, and in politics.  But there was always a mystery about Granville, somehow.  However, I expect he’ll be calling here in a few days, and then, no doubt, your curiosity will be gratified.”

“Oh, I know what he’ll be like,” said Austin.  “A lean, brown traveller, with his face tanned by tropic suns and Arctic snows to the colour of an old saddle-bag.  His hair, of course, prematurely grey.  On his right cheek there’ll be a lovely bright-blue scar, where a charming tiger scratched him just before he killed it with unerring aim.  I know the sort of person exactly.  And now he comes to say that he lays his battered, weather-worn old carcase at the feet of the cruel maid who spurned it when it was young and strong and beautiful.  And the cruel maid, now in the full bloom of placid maternity—­I mean maturity——­”

“Hold your tongue or I’ll pull your ears!” exclaimed Aunt Charlotte, scarlet with confusion.  “You’ll make me sorry I ever said anything to you on the subject.  Mr Ogilvie, as far as I can judge from his letter, is a most polished gentleman.  There’s a quaint, old-world courtesy about him which one scarcely ever meets with at the present day.  Just remember, if you please, that we’re simply two old friends, who are going to meet again after having lost sight of each other for five-and-twenty years; and what there is to laugh about in that I entirely fail to see.”