"There's more dignity in the name, at any rate," said Lorimer. "But I say, Mr. Güldmar, you are 'up' in history much better than I am. The annals of my country were grounded into my tender soul early in life, but I have a very hazy recollection of them. I know Henry VIII. got rid of his wives expeditiously and conveniently,--and I distinctly remember that Queen Elizabeth wore the first pair of silk stockings, and danced a kind of jig in them with the Earl of Leicester; these things interested me at the time,--and they now seen firmly impressed on my memory to the exclusion of everything else that might possibly be more important."
Old Güldmar smiled, but Thelma laughed outright and her eyes danced mirthfully.
"Ah, I do know you now!" she said, nodding her fair head at him wisely. "You are not anything that is to be believed! So I shall well understand you,--that is, you are a very great scholar,--but that it pleases you to pretend you are a dunce!"
Lorimer's face brightened into a very gentle and winning softness as he looked at her.
"I assure you, Miss Güldmar, I am not pretending in the least. I'm no scholar. Errington is, if you like! If it hadn't been for him, I should never have learned anything at Oxford at all. He used to leap over a difficulty while I was looking at it. Phil, don't interrupt me,--you know you did! I tell you he's up to everything: Greek, Latin, and all the rest of it,--and, what's more, he writes well,--I believe,--though he'll never forgive me for mentioning it,--that he has even published some poems."
"Be quiet, George!" exclaimed Errington, with a vexed laugh. "You are boring Miss Güldmar to death!"
"What is boring?" asked Thelma gently, and then turning her eyes full on the young Baronet, she added, "I like to hear that you will pass your days sometimes without shooting the birds and killing the fish; it can hurt nobody for you to write." And she smiled that dreamy pensive smile, of hers that was so infinitely bewitching. "You must show me all your sweet poems!"
Errington colored hotly. "They are all nonsense, Miss Güldmar," he said quickly. "There's nothing 'sweet' about them, I tell you frankly! All rubbish, every line of them!"
"Then you should not write them," said Thelma quietly. "It is only a pity and a disappointment."