e of Mr. Britling's
hand. "That's Edith," he said, and returned at once to his car to put it
away. Mrs. Britling was a tall, freckled woman with pretty bright brown
hair and preoccupied brown eyes. She welcomed him with a handshake, and
then a wonderful English parlourmaid--she at least was according to
expectations--took his grip-sack and guided him to his room. "Lunch,
sir," she said, "is outside," and closed the door and left him to that
and a towel-covered can of hot water.

It was a square-looking old red-brick house he had come to, very
handsome in a simple Georgian fashion, with a broad lawn before it and
great blue cedar trees, and a drive that came frankly up to the front
door and then went off with Mr. Britling and the car round to unknown
regions at the back. The centre of the house was a big airy hall,
oak-panelled, warmed in winter only by one large fireplace and abounding
in doors which he knew opened into the square separate rooms that
England favours. Bookshelves and stuffed birds comforted the landing
outside his bedroom. He descended to find the hall occupied by a small
bright bristling boy in white flannel shirt and knickerbockers and bare
legs and feet. He stood before the vacant open fireplace in an attitude
that Mr. Direck knew instantly was also Mr. Britling's. "Lunch is in the
garden," the Britling scion proclaimed, "and I've got to fetch you. And,
I say! is it true? Are you American?"

"Why surely," said Mr. Direck.

"Well, I know some American," said the boy. "I learnt it."

"Tell me some," said Mr. Direck, smiling still more amiably.

"Oh! Well--God darn you! Ouch, Gee-whizz! Soak him, Maud! It's up to
you, Duke...."

"Now where did you learn all that?" asked Mr. Direck recovering.

"Out of the Sunday Supplement," said the youthful Britling.

"Why! Then you know all about Buster Brown," said Mr. Direck. "He's
Fine--eh?"

The Britling child hated Buster Brown. He regarded Buster Brown as a
totally unnecessary infant. He detested the way he wore his hair and the
peculiar cut of his knickerbockers and--him. He thought Buster Brown the
one drop of paraffin in the otherwise delicious feast of the Sunday
Supplement. But he was a diplomatic child.

"I think I like Happy Hooligan better," he said. "And dat ole Maud."

He reflected with joyful eyes, Buster clean forgotten. "Every week," he
said, "she kicks some one."

It came to Mr. Direck as a very pleasant discovery that a British infan