"With me talking a blue streak? I should talk a blue streak; that's my grandmother's, too. No, you must go. How will you ever get it done, if you don't?"
"I sha'n't if I do. Staying here is doing me good. I need to 'get up more strength.'"
She laughed, but remembered her grandmother. "No more tea," she said kindly. "Conscience! But I'll tell you—you may come back after you've worked."
"To-day?"
"To-morrow."
And for many to-morrows he came back. On one of them the talk once more reverted to the book that the Story Man was understood to be writing, in some mysterious Place of Pens and Paper.
"I hope it's a regular romance," Miss Theodosia said.
"Romance? What is that? Is there such a thing? There may have been once—"
Miss Theodosia's fair cheeks took on faint color. She turned upon him.
"Once nothing! I can't help it if that is slang; the occasion demands slang. Are you trying to tell me romance is dead?"