When I introduced Mr. Hamilton to Mrs. Kingston, she put on her glasses
and examined him curiously, and he said, with a rather formal smile,
not at all as he smiled at me:
"I've heard quite a lot about you from Miss Ascough, and am very glad
to meet you."
"I've known all about you for some time," she said, chuckling. And then
she added, "I don't know what I expected to see, but you don't quite
measure up to Nora's extravagant ideal."
"No, I suppose not," he said, his eyes twinkling. "I doubt if any man
could do that."
We were all laughing, and I said:
"Oh, well, I know he's not much to look at; but I'm crazy about him,
anyhow, and he wants to see the rooms."
He didn't think the little room nearly good enough for me, but he said
that big suite of rooms in front was just the thing. That made me
laugh. Did he suppose any stenographer could afford a luxurious suite
of rooms like that? There was a long room that ran across the front of
the house, with big bay-windows and a great fireplace, and opening out
from this room was a large bedroom, with a bath-room adjoining it.
As one may see, they weren't exactly the rooms a girl getting fifteen
dollars a week could afford.