Page:Three speeds forward.djvu/23

 having boomed Charlie in the way they did. He was their only son, and who could find fault with them for thinking him a paragon? They were forever talking about him, and bragging about him, and making us all crinkle with suspense and anticipation. Whenever there were four or five of us girls together, Mrs. Lepperts would say, in that arch and gracious manner that always reminded passing Englishmen of Queen Victoria: "Ah, who of you little buds is going to capture Prince Charlie?" And a tiny voice inside me always answered—to myself, of course—"Why, I am, to be sure!" And so the situation was ripe for what actually happened when he did come. I went into the scramble head-down, and didn't really have a good look at the prize till after I had grabbed it.

Then the disillusion came, and the rupture and the fuss and the gossip and the heartbreak generally. He was nice enough to look at, though rather pale, and aggravatingly languid and superior. Much more of a