"About your rings, you mean. I never look at them that I don't begin this sort of thing." Here, seeing an excellent opportunity for it, he takes her hand in his. "This little turquoise went to market, this little pearl stayed at home, this little emerald got some—er—cheese——"
"No, it wasn't," hastily. "It was roast beef."
"So it was. Better than cheese, any day. How stupid of me! I might have known an emerald—I mean a pig—wouldn't like cheese."
"I don't suppose it would like roast beef a bit better," says Monica; and then her lips part and she bursts into a merry laugh at the absurdity of the thing. She is such a child still that she finds the keenest enjoyment in it.
"Never mind," with dignity, "and permit me to tell you, Miss Beresford, that open ridicule is rude. To continue: this little pearl got none, and this little plain gold ring got—he got—what on earth did the little plain gold pig—I mean, ring—get?"
"Nothing. Just what you ought to get for such a badly-told story. He only cried, 'Wee.'"
"Oh, no, indeed. He shan't cry at all. I won't have tears connected with you in any way."
She glances up at him with eyes half shy, half pleased, and with the prettiest dawning smile upon her lips.
He clasps the slender fingers closer, as though loath to part with them, and yet his tale has come to a climax.
"If I have told my story so badly, perhaps I had better tell it all over again," he says, with a base assumption of virtuous regret.