Well, my boy, I was behind a hedge sunning
myself one day last week, and along comes a man saying in a pleasant,
conceited way of talking:
"'And now when the night was senescent'
(says he)
'And the star dials pointed to morn
At the end of the path a liquescent'
(says he)
'And nebulous lustre was born.'
"So I poked my eyes up over the hedge, but you had started to run, for
some unknown reason, and so I saw but the back of your beautiful head.
'Oh!' says I, 'there's a man for whom many of us might sigh,' and I
continued in my best Irish--"
"All right," Amory interrupted. "Now go back to yourself."
"Well, I will. I'm one of those people who go through the world giving
other people thrills, but getting few myself except those I read into men
on such nights as these. I have the social courage to go on the stage,
but not the energy; I haven't the patience to write books; and I never
met a man I'd marry. However, I'm only eighteen."
The storm was dying down softly and only the wind kept up its ghostly
surge and made the stack lean and gravely settle from side to side.
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