Flowers, lady? Buttonhole, gentleman?
Pencils, sir, three for five, to help a poor widow?' Do I do it
nicely, auntie, or, as a bread-winner accomplishment, were my lessons
in elocution entirely wasted?"
"Do be serious, my dear," said Aunt Ellen, letting her paper fall to
the floor, "long enough to tell me what you mean. Colonel Beaupree's
estate--"
"Colonel Beaupree's estate," interrupted Octavia, emphasizing her
words with appropriate dramatic gestures, "is of Spanish castellar
architecture. Colonel Beaupree's resources are--wind. Colonel
Beaupree's stocks are--water. Colonel Beaupree's income is--all
in. The statement lacks the legal technicalities to which I have been
listening for an hour, but that is what it means when translated."
"Octavia!" Aunt Ellen was now visibly possessed by consternation. "I
can hardly believe it. And it was the impression that he was worth a
million. And the De Peysters themselves introduced him!"
Octavia rippled out a laugh, and then became properly grave.
"_De mortuis nil_, auntie--not even the rest of it. The dear old
colonel--what a gold brick he was, after all! I paid for my bargain
fairly--I'm all here, am I not?--items: eyes, fingers, toes,
youth, old family, unquestionable position in society as called for
in the contract--no wild-cat stock here.
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