"Mrs. Turner, you aggrieve me, but I was there in April."
"And are they so delightfully situated?"
"Yea, verily,—blissfully."
"Was Miss Sanford there?"
"She came, alas! the very eve I hied me hence. I saw her but a moment; 'twas——"
"You saw her? Tell us what she's like. Is she pretty? is she sweet-mannered as they say?"
"Sweet? She's sweet, aye, dix-huit; at least she was a year agone. Pretty? Ah me!" And Blake sighed profoundly, and straddled the rail a picture of dejection. His auditors groaned in chorus, the customary recognition of one of Blake's puns, but gathered about him in manifest interest. With all his rattling nonsense he was a regimental pet.
"But where is she from? What connection of the New Jersey Sanford?"
"The Autocrat of the Preakness Stable, mean you? Marry, I know not. She is a Sanford and has a Sanford's wealth, but 'twas not for me. She adores a horse and worships a horseman. This I gathered from our too brief converse. I strove to win her ear with poesie, but she bade me cease. Her soul is not attuned to melody,—she'd none of mine. She preferred my Lady Truscott and buttered muffins."
"What did Truscott say about Crook's fight with Crazy Horse?" asked Ray, who looked blank enough at Blake's jargon, and wanted facts.