The children of middle-aged people seem occasionally to come into the
world ready tamed. With a certain old-fashioned primness, they step
sedately through the paths of childhood. So good, so easy to manage,
so--uninteresting?

The children of the very young have sometimes an extra allowance of
their father's youth in their blood. At any rate the little Mortimers
had.

Their joy was ecstatic, their play was fervent, and as hard as any work.
They seemed month by month to be crowding up to their father, in point
of stature, and when he and they all went about the garden together,
some would be treading on his heels, the select two who had hold of his
arms would be shouting in his ears, and the others, dancing in front,
were generally treading on his toes, in their desire to get as near as
possible and inform him of all the wonderful things that were taking
place in this new and remarkable world.

Into this family the lonely little heir of the Melcombes was shortly
invited to come for awhile, but for some trivial reason his mother
declined the invitation, at the same time expressing her hope that Mr.
Mortimer would kindly renew it some other time.

It was not convenient to John Mortimer to invite the boy again for a
long time--so long that his mother bitterly repented not having accepted
the first invitation. She had an aunt living at Dartmouth, and whenever
her boy was invited by John Mortimer, she meant to bring him herself,
giving out that she was on her way to visit that relative.

Who knew what might happen?