He was a tall, lanky man whose shoulders sagged
as though something about them had broken under the strain of being
dignified; his face narrowed from an impressive dome of a forehead to a
straggling Van Dyke beard which he always stroked with the fingers of
his left hand. He was the old type of schoolmaster whom the rapid
forward stride of education had left far behind. His summons to Gray
Manor had come rather in the way of a life-saver and he did not intend
to allow the fact that the Forsyth heir had turned out to be a girl,
perturb him in the least. And so long as his rooms at the Manor were
comfortable, his food good and his salary certain, he could adapt
himself to any fool theory this lawyer guardian might care to advance.
Mr. Allendyce stared hard at the other, his face wrinkled in his effort
to say the right thing.
"Oh, let her have her head," he finished finally. And he liked that idea
so well that he repeated it. "Let her have her head. Do you understand
me? Never mind what's in the old schoolbooks. If she'd rather take a
walk than study Latin verbs, well, let her. I want her to be happy
here--happy, that's most important.
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