Take my arm, Mrs. Peckover: I mean to give the
students of my new drawing academy a holiday for the rest of the night,
in honor of your arrival. What do you say to devoting the evening in
the old way to a game at cards?"
"Just what I was thinking I should like myself as long as it's only
sixpence a game, sir," said Mrs. Peckover gaily. "I say, young
gentleman," she continued, addressing Zack after Mr. Blyth had left her
to look for the cards, "what nonsense are you writing on our darling's
slate that puts her all in a flutter, and makes her blush up to the
eyes, when she's only looking at her poor old Peck? Bless her heart!
she's just as easily amused now as when she was a child. Give us
another kiss, my own little love. You understand what I mean, don't
you, though you can't hear me? Ah, dear, dear! when she stands and
looks at me with her eyes like that, she's the living image of--"
"Cribbage," cried Mr. Blyth, knocking a triangular board for three
players on the table, and regarding Mrs. Peckover with the most
reproachful expression that his features could assume.
She felt that the look had been deserved, and approached the card-table
rather confusedly, without uttering another word. But for Valentine's
second interruption she would have declared, before young Thorpe, that
"little Mary" was the living image of her mother.
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