could n't chaperon me, don't you know? And your being my aunt makes it all the better. You 'd never do for my chaperon in the world if it wer' n't for that, you young-looking thing, you! I declare you don't look a day older than I do!"
Mrs. Bell Lawton did, indeed, look very young in her widow's cap, which lay in its graceful Marie Stuart triangle very lightly on her pretty blond hair, and made her look, as widow's caps always make young and pretty woman look, far less like a mourner than she would have looked without it.
"Now, Susan, don't talk nonsense," said Mrs. Lawton. "You know I 'm twenty-five next month, and I 'm sure that is antiquated. Oh, dear, if I were only eighteen, like you!"
"What then?" asked honest Susan. "Why is eighteen any better than twenty-five, Bell?"
"Oh, I don't know," replied Bell, confusedly. "I don't suppose it is any better?"
"I don't think it 's half so good," said Susan "or, at any rate, half so good as twenty-one. I 'm dying to be twenty-one. I want all my money!"
"Why, Susan Sweetser!" exclaimed Bell. "What on earth would you do with any more money? You can't spend all your income now."
"Can't I?" laughed Susan. "You just try me and see! I 'm overdrawn on this quarter already; and it 's so disagreeable to be told of it. Dear Uncle Tom never told me. He was a great deal nicer for a guardian than this old Mr. Clark is."
