"No, not a week; and think what he's passed through before and since!"
"He will be all the better for going. The change will do him good," Mr. Seymour answered, toying with her hair.
"Sometime, papa, but not now. Wait till he is strong. He can study with me; why not?"
"Oh, fie on you! But what do you think, Job?" Mr. Seymour asked after a pause. "Suppose we leave it until another day. There is some sense in what Kit says," he went on, patting her cheeks. "Gilbert doesn't look very rugged, and besides he could not do much before the summer vacation."
"I had not thought of his health," Uncle Job answered, looking me over as one might a horse he thought of running for first prize.
"Nor I; but it's as puss says, or a little that way," Mr. Seymour answered.
"Well, then, let the matter drop for the present," Uncle Job responded. "An education is not worth much if one breaks down in getting it. So go and build yourself up, young man, and we will talk about it again."
Thus happily, through Constance's sweet intervention, I was granted a further respite, and this more to my liking than I would have cared to tell, for I was now become greatly enamored of my liberty, and thought little of books, except as I might read them when Constance was by.
Being in this way freed from all anxiety, Constance and I did not lack for ways in which to pass the time agreeably in each other's company. If the weather happened to be fair, we rode or drove; or if there was snow, went coasting on the bluff back of the town. The thing, however, most to our liking, and of which we never tired, was skating. For this we went to the river, but later, and best of all, to Mr. Appletop's in the park across the road from the Dragon. This gentleman, now very old and feeble, was the father of the village, but a mystery to all its people, no one knowing his history, he having come into the country while it was still occupied by the Sacs and Foxes. A wanderer and misanthropist it was believed, he after a while married an Indian woman, and then, as if tired of roaming, settled down a little apart from the tribe in the house he still occupied. His wife dying about the time of Black Hawk's war, he remained when the Indians left, and in this way acquired a title to the land upon which the town stood. Being improvident and of careless habits, he had little by little parted with all his holdings until now he had scarce anything left save the park wherein his house stood. Here he lived without servants or companions of any kind, if I except a number of dogs he kept about him, some of which were of good breed, but in the main were of no account whatever. Seeing Constance and I skating one day on a small piece of ice beside the road, he asked us to come to the lake in his private grounds. This we did, to our great delight, and also to his no small pleasure, I must believe, for he used to sit and watch us and applaud everything Constance did for hours at a time.