"
"Oh, if that goes for anything. I can put up a hundred-pound bar till
further orders; but what sort of a calling is that?"
Some little joke about being called to the bar flickered up in Miss
Walker's mind, but her companion was in such obvious earnest that she
stifled down her inclination to laugh.
"I can do a mile on the cinder-track in 4:50 and across-country in 5:20,
but how is that to help me? I might be a cricket professional, but it
is not a very dignified position. Not that I care a straw about
dignity, you know, but I should not like to hurt the old lady's
feelings.
"Your aunt's?"
"Yes, my aunt's. My parents were killed in the Mutiny, you know, when I
was a baby, and she has looked after me ever since. She has been very
good to me. I'm sorry to leave her."
"But why should you leave her?" They had reached the garden gate, and
the girl leaned her racket upon the top of it, looking up with grave
interest at her big white-flanneled companion.
"It's, Browning," said he.
"What!"
"Don't tell my aunt that I said it"--he sank his voice to a whisper--"I
hate Browning."
Clara Walker rippled off into such a merry peal of laughter that he
forgot the evil things which he had suffered from the poet, and burst
out laughing too.
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