think"--scrutinizing him exhaustively through
her glasses--"_in yours_, it was not customary for a young _gentlewoman_
to go out walking, alone, with '_a man_'!!" If she had said with a
famished tiger, she couldn't have thrown more horror into her tone.

The professor had shrunk a little from that classing of her age with
his, but has now found matter for hope in it.

"Still--my age--as you suggest--so far exceeds Perpetua's--I am indeed
so much older than she is, that I might be allowed to escort her
wherever it might please her to go."

"The _real_ age of a man now-a-days, sir, is a thing impossible to
know," says Miss Majendie. "You wear glasses--a capital disguise! I mean
nothing offensive--_so far_--sir, but it behoves me to be careful, and
behind those glasses, who can tell what demon lurks? Nay! No offence! An
_innocent_ man would _feel_ no offence!"

"Really, Miss Majendie!" begins the poor professor, who is as red as
though he were the guiltiest soul alive.

"Let me proceed, sir. We were talking of the ages of men."

_"We?"_

"Certainly! It was you who suggested the idea, that, being so much older
than my niece, Miss Wynter, you could therefore escort her here and
there--in fact _everywhere_--in fact"--with awful meaning--"_any_
where!"

"I assure you, madam," begins the professor, springing to his
feet--Perpetua puts out a white hand.

"Ah! let her talk," says she. "_Then_ you will understand."

"But men's ages, sir, are a snare and a delusion!" continues Miss
Majendie, who has mounted her hobby, and will ride it to the death. "Who
can tell the age of any man in this degenerate age? We look at their
faces, and say _he_ must be so and so, and _he_ a few years younger, but
looks are vain, they tell us nothing. Some look old, because they _are_
old, some look old--through _vice_!"

The professor makes an impatient gesture. But Miss Majendie is equal to
most things.

"'Who excuses himself _accuses_ himself,'" quotes she with terrible
readiness. "Why that gesture, Mr. Curzon? I made no mention of _your_
name. And, indeed, I trust your age would place you outside of any such
suspicion, still, I am bound to be careful where my niece's interests
are concerned. You, as her guardian, if a _faithful_ guardian" (with
open doubt, as to this, expressed in eye and pointed finger), "should be
the first to applaud my caution."

"You take an extreme view," begins the professor, a little feebly,
perhaps. That ey