" The Major bowed,
and Betty gave a merry little nod. "If you hadn't put it so nicely, I
should never have forgiven you," she laughed; "but he always puts it
nicely, Major, doesn't he? I made him the other day a plum pudding of my
very own,--I wouldn't even let Aunt Floretta seed the raisins,--and when it
came on burnt, what do you think he said? Why, I asked him how he liked it,
and he thought for a minute and replied, 'My dear, it's the very best burnt
plum pudding I ever ate.' Now wasn't that dear of him?"
"Ah, but you should have heard how he put things when he was in politics,"
said the Major, refilling his glass. "On my word, he could make the truth
sound sweeter than most men could make a lie."
"Come, come, Major," protested the Governor. "Julia, can't you induce our
good friend to forbear?"
"He knows I like to hear it," said Mrs. Ambler, turning from a discussion
of her Christmas dinner with Mrs. Lightfoot.
"Then you shall hear it, madam," declared the Major, "and I may as well say
at once that if the Governor hasn't told you about the reply he made to
Plaintain Dudley when he asked him for his political influence, you haven't
the kind of husband, ma'am, that Molly Lightfoot has got. Keep a secret
from Molly! Why, I'd as soon try to keep a keg full of brandy from
following an auger."
"Auger, indeed!" exclaimed the little old lady, to whom the Major's
facetiousness was the only serious thing about him.
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