The Right Stuff: Some Episodes in the Career of a North BritonHay, Ian
General
The Right Stuff: Some Episodes in the Career of a North Briton
Hay, Ian
Great Britain -- Fiction
On being presented, both smiled shyly and modestly, and each
simultaneously proffered a timid hand. The average young man, already a
little rattled by the duplicate vision of loveliness before him, could
never make up his mind which hand to shake first; and by the time he had
collected his faculties sufficiently to make an uncertain grab at one,
both would be swiftly and simultaneously withdrawn.
Robin, however, immediately shook hands with Dilly, who stood nearest to
Kitty, and then with Dolly. After that he stepped back a pace and
surveyed the pair with unconcealed interest.
Then he turned to my wife.
"A truly remarkable resemblance!" he observed benignantly. ("Just as if
we had been two babies in a bassinette!" as Dolly afterwards remarked.)
Then he resumed his inspection. The Twins, who were entirely unused to
this sort of thing, were too taken aback to proceed to their second
move--the utterance of some trivial and artless remark, delivered by
both simultaneously, and thereby calculated to throw the victim into a
state of uncertainty as to which he should answer first. Instead, they
stood wide-eyed and tongue-tied before him.
"I must certainly discover some point of difference between these
ladies," continued Robin with an air of determination, "or I shall
always be in difficulties. Do not tell me the secret, Mrs Inglethwaite.
Perhaps I can find out for myself."
He concluded a minute inspection of the indignant Dilly, and turned his
unruffled gaze on Dolly.
"Yes," he said, "I have it! You" (triumphantly to Dolly) "have a tiny
brown spot in the blue of your left eye, while your sister has none."
It was quite true: she had. But it was a fact which most young men only
discovered after many furtive and sidelong glances. This imperturbable
creature had taken it all in in one resolute scrutiny; and Dolly,
blushing like Aurora--an infirmity to which I may say neither she nor
her sister are particularly subject--dropped her long lashes over the
orbs in question and looked uncommonly foolish.
The tension of the situation was relieved by the announcement of
luncheon, and Robin was called upon to accompany Kitty downstairs; while
I, putting a consoling arm round the waist of each of my fermenting
sisters-in-law, marched them down to further experiences in the
dining-room.
The Twins rapidly recovered their equanimity at lunch. They sat, as they
always did, together on one side of the table, opposite to Robin. The
latter conversed easily and pleasantly, though his discourse was dotted
with homely phrases and curious little biblical turns of speech.
"Have you been in London long, Mr Fordyce?" inquired Kitty as we settled
down.
"Three years," said Robin.
"I suppose you have lots of friends by this time."
"I have a good many acquaintances, but my friends in London are just
three, all told," said Robin, in what Dilly afterwards described as "a
disgustingly pawky manner."
"You must be very exclusive, Mr Fordyce," chirrupped Dolly.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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