Thus absorbed in the delicacy of their relationship, they stepped the length of the terrace in silence. Then—
"I don't know what you're thinking about," said Valerie, "but I should like to."
Anthony shook his head.
"I'll tell you a story instead," he said. "If you like, that is."
"Please."
She turned and leaned her arms upon the stone balustrade, overlooking dim lawns and, beyond, the pale ghost of a great park that seemed to stretch and roll unlimited into the depths of a distance which Night had bewitched.
"There was once," said Anthony, "a frog. He wasn't much of a frog, as frogs go. In fact, with the exception that he had no home and no friends, he was a very ordinary frog indeed. One day when he was sick and tired of being alone, he went out and bought a tame minnow. Considering how poor he was, it was very reckless, because it meant that there were now two mouths to feed instead of one, but the minnow and the frog became such great friends that that didn't seem to matter. At last, sure enough, the day of reckoning arrived. The larder was empty, the minnow's appetite was as healthy as ever, and the frog was down to his last penny. So, after a lot of thought, he left the minnow playing in a quiet pool, and went out to earn some flies. By dint of toiling very hard all day, he managed to earn enough to keep the minnow and himself, but it meant that the two had very little time together, and that was a shame.
"Well, one day the frog got back to the pool a little earlier than usual, and, chancing to lift up his eyes, there seated upon the bank he saw a real live Princess. What the frog thought, when he saw her, may be imagined. What he felt doesn't matter. Enough that he was profoundly moved. So moved that he almost forgot to give the minnow his flies. And long after the Princess had risen and gone away, the frog kept thinking of her, and thinking, and thinking…. And then, all of a sudden, he began to wish, as he had never wished before, that he wasn't a frog.
"Now, vain desires are the most persistent of all.
"The frog wished and wished, and cursed himself for a fool, and wished again…. At last he could bear it no longer, so he went to a water-rat who was so old that he was said to be wise, and sought his advice.