But did Aunt Jane let me go? She did not. Why, she seemed almost more
shocked than she had been over Charlie Smith and Fred Small, and the
others.
"Mercy, child!" she exclaimed. "Where in the world do you pick
up these people?" And she brought out that "these people" _so_
disagreeably! Why, you'd think Mr. Livingstone was a foreign Japanese,
or something.
I told her then quietly, and with dignity, and with no temper
(showing), that Mr. Livingstone was not a foreign Japanese, but was a
very nice gentleman; and that I had not picked him up. He came to her
own door himself, almost every day.
"My own door!" exclaimed Aunt Jane. And she looked absolutely
frightened. "You mean to tell me that that creature has been coming
here to see you, and I not know it?"
I told her then--again quietly and with dignity, and without temper
(showing)--that he had been coming, not to see me, but in the natural
pursuance of his profession of delivering groceries. And I said
that he was not a creature. On the contrary, he was, I was sure, an
estimable young man. He went to her own church and Sunday-School.
Besides, I could vouch for him myself, as I knew him well, having seen
and talked with him almost every day for a long while, when he came to
the house.
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