"Well employed, poor little fellow, saving the people in those three
cottages of his. No one supposed his shop in danger, but the fire
took a sudden freak and came down Long Street; and though the house
is standing, it had to be emptied and deluged with water to save it.
I never knew Pettitt had a mother till I found her mounting guard,
like one distracted, over her son's bottles of perfumery."

"And dyes?" murmured Raymond under his breath; but Frank caught the
sound, and said, "Ah, Julius! don't I remember his inveigling you
into coming out with scarlet hair?"

"I don't think I've seen him since," said Julius, laughing. "I
believe he couldn't resist such an opportunity of practising his
art. And for my part, I must say for myself, that it was in our
first holidays, and Raymond and Miles had been black and blue the
whole half-year from having fought my battles whenever I was called
either 'Bunny' or 'Grandfather.' So when he assured me he could
turn my hair to as sweet a raven-black as Master Poynsett's, I
thought it would be pleasing to all, forgetting that he could not
dye my eyes, and that their effect would have been some degrees more
comical."

"For shame, Julius!" said Rosamond. "Don't you know that one
afternoon, when Nora had cried for forty minutes over her sum, she
declared that she wanted to make her eyes as beautiful as Mr.
Charnock's. Well, what was the effect?"

"Startling," said Raymond. "He came down in shades of every kind of
crimson and scarlet. A fearful object, with his pink-and-white face
glowing under it."