Page:Meanwhile (1927).pdf/15

 Chestnut Street. Rhoda's visits to Boston were infrequent,—she preferred the dogs and speed-boat at Aldergrove,—and Grover, being a tractable young man, as well as fond of Rhoda, occasionally shared her duty calls, having none of his own. His fondness for Rhoda was like a fondness for cinnamon buns: unconscious, profound, prosaic, and old as memory. Rhoda and his mother: they were lenses through which he had seen a very considerable proportion of the little he had seen of life.

"They're vague and sympathetic, maiden aunts," he defended. "One can tell them the first convenient fib that comes into one's head and they swallow it gratefully. What I draw the line at is your maiden uncles. They pretend to know better. And ask you how old you are and what you're going to do for a living."

"Well, what are you?"

"How should I know!"

"For goodness sake don't keep crossing over whenever we change sidewalks, it drives me nutty; nobody is so pedantic any more but you . . . For my part I'd rather be asked all that by a fatherly old bachelor who'll remember my birthday than be asked my mother's middle name by an old maid who won't,—or if she does, send you a present of a hunk of moth-eaten lace your great grandmother who's been dead for centuries wore sewed on to her panties. If they're your relation they object to the way you dress; if