"Alas, no."
"Now, why plunge into the eternal triangle? There is really no rôle for you unless you propose to supplant the cow. What, by the way, is her name?"
"Grace."
"I don't like the statuesque," he said, wrinkling up his eyes. "Look at her ecstatic vacant expression. A dangerous combination."
Virginia wished she had not given him this theme. He would weave it into such marvellous patterns that she would never be able to get it out intact again.
"I must have some more facts," he said. "What is the squirrel called?"
"Estelle."
"And the hero?"
"Edgar."
"More and more suitable. What prophetic parents! How admirably they kept their heads at the font. The squirrel is very vivacious—is it a brave front, a blind eye or a shallow heart?"