“Let’s give them tea,” said Elise, tilting her spoon until a few drops fell into the water.
“You’ll make them nervous,” warned Patty, “and Juliet is high-strung, anyway.”
Then Nan came in from her afternoon’s round of calls, and then Mr. Fairfield arrived, and they too were called upon to make friends with Darby and Juliet.
“Goldfish always make me think of a story about Whistler,” said Mr. Fairfield. “It seems, Whistler once had a room in a house in Florence, directly over a person who had some pet goldfish in a bowl. Every pleasant day the bowl was set out on the balcony, which was exactly beneath Whistler’s balcony. For days he resisted the temptation to fish for them with a bent pin and a string; but at last he succumbed to his angling instincts, and caught them all. Then, remorseful at what he had done, he fried them to a fine golden brown, and returned them to their owner on a platter.”
“Ugh!” cried Nan, “what a horrid story! Why do they always tack unpleasant stories on poor old Whistler? Now, I know a lovely story about a goldfish, which I will relate. It is said to be the composition of a small Boston schoolchild.
| “‘Oh, Robin, lovely goldfish! Who teached you how to fly? Who sticked the fur upon your breast? ’Twas God, ’twas God what done it.’ |
Isn’t that lovely?”
“It is, indeed,” agreed Kenneth. “If that’s Boston precocity, it’s more attractive than I thought.”
“But it doesn’t rhyme,” said Elise.
“No,” said Patty; “that’s the beauty of it. It’s blank verse, as the greatest poetry often is. Don’t go yet, Elise. Stay to dinner, can’t you?”