Page:Tales of the long bow.pdf/285

 wig. His wife Elizabeth was even less marked, for she was younger; she had the same slightly nervous or short-sigthed look in the eyes that was like a humanizing touch to her beauty made of ivory and gold. But though she was not old she had always been a little old-fashioned; for she came of a forgotten aristocracy whose women had moved with a certain gravity as we'll as grace about the old country houses, before coronets were sold like cabbages or the Jews lent money to the squires. But her husband was old-fashioned too; though he had just taken part in a successful revolution and bore a revolutionary name, he also had his prejudices; and one of them was a weakness for his wife being a lady—especially that lady.

"Owen," she said, looking up from the tea-table with alarmed severity, "you've been buying more old books."

"As it happens, these are particularly new books," he replied; "but I suppose in one sense it's all ancient history now."

"What ancient history? "she asked. "Is it a History of Babylon or prehistoric China?"

"It is a History of Us."

"I hope not," she said; "but what do you mean?"

"I mean it's a history of Our Revolution,"