"He _is_ not our future benefactor," cry I, energetically, whisking
swiftly round to face them again, and dropping my hands, "he _never_
will be!--he does not _want_ to be! He wants to--to--to MARRY ME!
there!"

The murder is out. The match is set to the gunpowder train. Now for the
explosion!

The clock-hand reaches the quarter--passes it; but in all the assembly
there is no sound. The westering sun shines in on four open mouths (the
youthful Tou Tou is absent), on four pairs of stupidly-staring eyes. The
rocking-chair has ceased rocking. Bobby's sneeze has stopped half-way.
There is a petrified silence.

At length, "_Marry you_!" says the Brat, in a deeply-accented tone of
low and awed disbelief. "Why, he was at school with father!"

"I wish to heavens that he had never been at school anywhere!" cry I, in
a fury. "I am sick to death of hearing that he was at school with
father. Will no one ever forget it?"

"He is for-ty-sev-en!" says Algy, at last closing his mouth, and
speaking with slow impressiveness. "Nineteen from forty-seven! how many
years older than you?"

"Do not count!" cry I, pettishly; "what is the use? not all the counting
in the world will make him any younger."

"It is not true!" cries Bobby, with boisterous skepticism, jumping up
from his seat, and making a plunge at me; "it is a _hoax_! she has been