“We don’t expect it of the head of the firm,” said Will grandly; “there’s substitutes and subordinates.” But his hand drooped with a sense of bathos. “Ay,” said the old man, swelling, “subordinators and granddarters.” He fished for the hand. “Oughtn’t we to let ’em know?” Will insinuated. “Oi allus liked young Flynt, your father,” answered the Gaffer, squeezing his fingers heartily. “And there warn’t much amiss with your mother. A forthright family, aldoe Peculiar. Jinny droives a-Sundays to chapel with the buoy-oys!” At which sudden failure—or rather resurgence—of memory, Will felt more urgently than ever the need of getting Jinny’s consent rather than the nonagenarian’s. “You’re mighty lucky,” he said craftily, “to have a granddaughter so spry. I reckon we’d better have her down and tell her.” “Ay, that Oi be,” replied the Gaffer. “’Tis heartenin’ to hear her singin’ up and down the house.” Indeed a little silvery trill was reaching them now. To Will it recalled more than one moment of mockery, but he felt nothing provocative in this song except its parade of happiness. It seemed to fling back his compassion, to be ominous of a refusal of his proposition. Perhaps, on second thoughts, it might be better to leave the old man to present her with a finished fact. “Well, I must be getting home,” he said. “Glad that’s settled.” Daniel clutched the knife again. “And we’ll cut the cake upon it.” “No, no.” Mistake or no mistake, it seemed sacrilegious to slice into this quasi-ecclesiastical magnificence. “But it’s a bargain. Jinny shall cut it. Jinny!” he called up. “Just coming, Gran’fer.” “That’s too grand for a bargain,” Will remonstrated. “Would almost do for a wedding,” he added with sly malice. “Well, ain’t this for a pardnership?” the old man cackled. He moved to the door and stood looking out on the horses. “Steady, my beauties,” he said proprietorially. He shuffled to them and rubbed a voluptuous hand along the satiny sheen of their skins. “Flynt and Quarles,” he murmured. Will had taken the opportunity to escape from the house. He now prepared to light his lamps. Bats were swooping and darting, weaving their weird patterns, but the air was still uncooled. “Ye’re not a-gooin’ afore the cake’s cut!” the Gaffer protested. “I’d best not see Jinny—she might only fly at me.” “Rubbidge. When we’ve made it up!” “But I’m late, and I shouldn’t wonder if there’s a thunderstorm.” “Won’t take half a jiffy!” He dashed into the house and seized the knife. Will was only in time to arrest his uplifted arm, and Jinny, descending on the tableau, had a tragi-comic sense of rushing betwixt a murderer and her lover. “What are you doing, Gran’fer?” she gasped.