La Beale Isoud slenderly tall in a straight girdled gown of grey-green velvet, head thrown back so that her filleted golden hair brushed her shoulders, violet eyes half-closed, and an “antique”-looking flasket clasped in her two slim hands; and Sir Tristram so imperiously dark and handsome in his crimson, fur-trimmed doublet, his two hands stretched out and gripping her two shoulders, his black eyes burning as if to look through her closed lids—the magical love-potion... love that never would depart for weal neither for woe...
Missy closed her eyes tight, as if fearing what they might behold in the flesh. But when she opened them again, Aunt Isabel was only gazing into the drained flasket with a rueful expression.
Then they went back and got another soda for Uncle Charlie. And poor Uncle Charlie, unsuspecting, seemed to enjoy it.
During the remainder of that evening Missy was unusually subdued. She realized, of course, that there were no love-potions nowadays; that they existed only in the Middle Ages; and that the silver flasket contained everyday ice-cream soda. And she wasn't sure she knew exactly what the word “symbol” meant, but she felt that somehow the ice-cream soda, shared between them, was symbolic of that famous, fateful drink. She wished acutely that this second episode, so singularly parallel, hadn't happened.
She was still absorbed in gloomy meditations when Mr. Saunders arose to go.
“Oh, it's early yet,” protested Uncle Charlie—dear, kind, ignorant Uncle Charlie!
“But I've got to catch the ten-thirty-five,” said Mr. Saunders.
“Why can't you stay over till to-morrow night,” suggested Aunt Isabel. She had risen, too, and now put her hand on Mr. Saunders's sleeve; her face looked quite pleading in the moonlight. “There's to be a dance in Odd Fellows' Hall.”
“I'd certainly love to stay.” He even dared to take hold of her hand openly. “But I've got to be in Paola in the morning, and Blue Mound next day.”
“The orchestra's coming down from Macon City,” she cajoled.