The Rivet in Grandfathers Neck | Page 8

a delicate question, an affair of nuances, of almost imperceptible
graduations; and in debating a matter of such nicety, a man must
necessarily lay aside all petty irritation, such as being nettled by an
irrational nickname, and approach the question with unbiased mind.
He did. And when, at last, he had come warily to the verge of decision,
Miss Musgrave in all innocence announced that they would excuse him
if he wished to get back to his work.
He discovered that, somehow, the three had finished supper; and,
somehow, he presently discovered himself in his study, where eight

o'clock had found him every evening for the last ten years, when he
was not about his social diversions. An old custom, you will observe, is
not lightly broken.

VI
Subsequently: "I have never approved of these international marriages,"
said Colonel Musgrave, with heat. "It stands to reason, she is simply
marrying the fellow for his title. _(The will of Jeremiah Brown, dated
29 November, 1690, recorded 2 February, 1690-1, mentions his wife
Eliza Brown and appoints her his executrix.)_ She can't possibly care
for him. _(This, then, was the second wife of Edward Osborne of
Henrico, who, marrying him 15 June, 1694, died before January,
1696-7.)_ But they are all flibbertigibbets, every one of them. _(She
had apparently no children by either marriage--)_ And I dare say she is
no better than the rest."
Came a tap on the door. Followed a vision of soft white folds and
furbelows and semi-transparencies and purple eyes and a pouting
mouth.
"I am become like a pelican in the wilderness, Olaf," the owner of these
vanities complained. "Are you very busy? Cousin Agatha is about her
housekeeping, and I have read the afternoon paper all through,--even
the list of undelivered letters and the woman's page,--and I just want to
see the Gilbert Stuart picture," she concluded,--exercising, one is afraid,
a certain economy in regard to the truth.
This was a little too much. If a man's working-hours are not to be
respected--if his privacy is to be thus invaded on the flimsiest of
pretexts,--why, then, one may very reasonably look for chaos to come
again. This, Rudolph Musgrave decided, was a case demanding firm
and instant action. Here was a young person who needed taking down a
peg or two, and that at once.
But he made the mistake of looking at her first. And after that, he lied

glibly. "Good Lord, no! I am not in the least busy now. In fact, I was
just about to look you two up."
"I was rather afraid of disturbing you." She hesitated; and a lucent
mischief woke in her eyes. "You are so patriarchal, Olaf," she lamented.
"I felt like a lion venturing into a den of Daniels. But if you cross your
heart you aren't really busy--why, then, you can show me the Stuart,
Olaf."
It is widely conceded that Gilbert Stuart never in his after work
surpassed the painting which hung then in Rudolph Musgrave's
study,--the portrait of the young Gerald Musgrave, afterward the friend
of Jefferson and Henry, and, still later, the author of divers bulky tomes,
pertaining for the most part to ethnology. The boy smiles at you from
the canvas, smiles ambiguously,--smiles with a woman's mouth, set
above a resolute chin, however,--and with a sort of humorous sadness
in his eyes. These latter are of a dark shade of blue--purple, if you
will,--and his hair is tinged with red.
"Why, he took after me!" said Miss Stapylton. "How thoughtful of him,
Olaf!"
And Rudolph Musgrave saw the undeniable resemblance. It gave him a
queer sort of shock, too, as he comprehended, for the first time, that the
faint blue vein on that lifted arm held Musgrave blood,--the same blood
which at this thought quickened. For any person guided by appearances,
Rudolph Musgrave considered, would have surmised that the vein in
question contained celestial ichor or some yet diviner fluid.
"It is true," he conceded, "that there is a certain likeness."
"And he is a very beautiful boy," said Miss Stapylton, demurely.
"Thank you, Olaf; I begin to think you are a dangerous flatterer. But he
is only a boy, Olaf! And I had always thought of Gerald Musgrave as a
learned person with a fringe of whiskers all around his face--like a
centerpiece, you know."
The colonel smiled. "This portrait was painted early in life. Our

kinsman was at that time, I believe, a person of rather frivolous
tendencies. Yet he was not quite thirty when he first established his
reputation by his monograph upon The Evolution of Marriage. And
afterwards, just prior to his first meeting with Goethe, you will
remember--"
"Oh, yes!" Miss Stapylton assented, hastily; "I remember perfectly. I
know all about him, thank you. And it was that