without the resource of her parents, who, as has been related, never
budged out of the cosy corner in which she planted them for the day.
Her brother was always in the smoking-room, where Vogelstein observed
him, in very tight clothes, his neck encircled with a collar like a
palisade. He had a sharp little face, which was not disagreeable; he
smoked enormous cigars and began his drinking early in the day: but his
appearance gave no sign of these excesses. As regards euchre and poker
and the other distractions of the place he was guilty of none. He
evidently understood such games in perfection, for he used to watch the
players, and even at moments impartially advise them; but Vogelstein
never saw the cards in his hand. He was referred to as regards disputed
points, and his opinion carried the day. He took little part in the
conversation, usually much relaxed, that prevailed in the smoking-room,
but from time to time he made, in his soft flat youthful voice, a remark
which every one paused to listen to and which was greeted with roars of
laughter. Vogelstein, well as he knew English, could rarely catch the
joke; but he could see at least that these must be choice specimens of
that American humour admired and practised by a whole continent and yet
to be rendered accessible to a trained diplomatist, clearly, but by some
special and incalculable revelation. The young man, in his way, was very
remarkable, for, as Vogelstein heard some one say once after the laughter
had subsided, he was only nineteen. If his sister didn’t resemble the
dreadful little girl in the tale already mentioned, there was for
Vogelstein at least an analogy between young Mr. Day and a certain small
brother—a candy-loving Madison, Hamilton or Jefferson—who was, in the
Tauchnitz volume, attributed to that unfortunate maid. This was what the
little Madison would have grown up to at nineteen, and the improvement
was greater than might have been expected.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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