“Auburn hair, if you please: mamma, calls it auburn, or golden, and so do all her friends. But even with my ‘long red hair,’ ” (and he waved his mane with a sort of triumph⁠—tawny he himself well knew that it was, and he was proud of the leonine hue), “I cannot possibly be queerer than is your ladyship.”

“You call me queer?”

“Certainly.”

(After a pause), “I think I shall go to bed.”

“A little thing like you ought to have been in bed many hours since; but you probably sat up in the expectation of seeing me?”

“No, indeed.”

“You certainly wished to enjoy the pleasure of my society. You knew I was coming home, and would wait to have a look at me.”

“I sat up for papa, and not for you.”