FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145  
146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   >>  
ve stranger, the young Marshalls already regarded the kindly doctor as a friend, and it was with very smiling faces that they rang his bell that afternoon. "I saw you arriving," cried their host, hastening to the door himself to meet them. "I was just looking out for you, and hoping you would come soon to interrupt a tiresome letter I felt obliged to write. Now I'm justified in putting it off for an hour or two at any rate. Linda's quite shocked at me! But I didn't say I wouldn't finish it afterwards, did I? Shall we go straight through to the pine wood? I've had the table carried out there for tea. It's the coolest place we can find on a hot day." By the time she had known him ten minutes, Sylvia had decided that she liked Dr. Severn immensely. He was a tall, rather gaunt man, with a thin, pale, clean-shaven face that bore traces of ill health or suffering in the hollow cheeks and the lines around the mouth; his hair was iron grey, rather long, and combed straight back from his broad forehead, and he had the brightest, keenest, pleasantest blue eyes that it was possible to imagine. His manner was so winning and jolly that he made everybody feel at home immediately. He seemed to know exactly the subjects about which boys and girls liked to talk, and to be able to enter into everything almost as if he were a boy himself. The four visitors soon found themselves chatting to him perfectly freely, telling him of school scrapes and adventures, of plans for the summer holidays, and asking his opinion on various disputed points, while he, in turn, was full of jokes and reminiscences of his own far-off schooldays. "Never save the best till last!" he declared, handing round the cake long before the plates of bread and butter were finished. "I've kept to that motto ever since I was a small boy, and I had very good reason for adopting it. Once, when I was a little fellow of about seven years old, I was taken to pay a visit to an old lady who lived in the country. Children were brought up on the plainest fare in those days--porridge, and bread and milk, roast beef or mutton with potatoes, rice pudding or suet dumpling, with jam roly-poly, as a special treat on your birthday, was all that was considered good for us; so you can imagine I felt pleased when I saw a large pudding full of currants come on to the table at dinner-time. The old lady gave me a generous serving, and told me to help myself to as much sugar as I liked wit
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145  
146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   >>  



Top keywords:
pudding
 

straight

 

imagine

 
reminiscences
 

handing

 

schooldays

 

declared

 

adventures

 

visitors

 

chatting


perfectly

 
opinion
 

disputed

 
points
 
holidays
 

summer

 

telling

 

freely

 

school

 

scrapes


fellow

 

special

 

birthday

 

potatoes

 

mutton

 
dumpling
 

considered

 

serving

 

generous

 

pleased


currants

 

dinner

 
adopting
 

reason

 

finished

 

butter

 

plainest

 

porridge

 

brought

 

country


Children
 
plates
 

shocked

 

putting

 

obliged

 
justified
 

carried

 
wouldn
 
finish
 

letter