I turn away saying: “No American parlor this, but fairyland, sung of poets and imagined in spirit by painters. As I become absent-minded, Show Off closes the doors and leaves me alone.”
I look straight up into the sky, thinking of the button, when an odd little sky speck attracts my inquisitiveness, for it is growing larger very last, as it no doubt is coming down very fast. Strangely heavy for a fleecy cloud, which it looks to be. Down to the opening, through to the tower top it stops by my side. The cloud is off, as out steps father and Saucy, and I spring convulsively to my feet off the rock I had leaned on in case.
Holding my hands together Mae quiets my nerves.
“O, auntie,” with glowing cheeks and shining eyes of sky angel. “Did you not know they do this here? See, this is the string of the cloud balloon I hold.”
“But Mae, the Traveler is up there and is not friendly.”
“O, Grandpa has been civilizing him, so I have asked him to the wedding.”
“How is that?”
“Serpenta is his niece, so he might as well come and be reconciled. Won’t there be an explosive,” she adds gleefully.
“Now Grandpa and Auntie,” as she sits down by my side, “take up your bill of fare, and while we dine, we will talk of going home.”
A table in our midst has been spread, a la American.