“What have you got to say, now that you’ve got me here?” he asked, putting down his music and looking at her.
“You bandersnatch!” Camelia still held his arm. “I am sure you look like a bandersnatch; a biting, snarling creature. You have a truly snatching way of speaking.”
“What have you got to say, Camelia?” Perior repeated, withdrawing his arm from the circling clasp upon it.
“I have got to say that you must stay to lunch.”
“Well, I can’t do that.”
“Then you may sit down and talk to me a little—scold me if you like; do you feel like scolding me?”
“I have never scolded you, Camelia,” said Perior, knowing that before her lightness his solemnity showed to disadvantage; but he would be nothing but solemn, ludicrously solemn if necessary.
“You were never sure I deserved it, then,” said Camelia, stooping to gather up her dog for a swift kiss, and laughing over his round head at Perior’s stiffness; “else you would have done your duty, I am sure—you never forget your duty.”
“Thanks; your recognition is flattering.”
“There, my pet, go—poor Sir Arthur is lonely, go to him,” said Camelia, opening the window for Siegfried’s exit, “you know your sarcasm doesn’t impress me one bit—not one bit,” she added.