“All right. I’ll not breathe a single syllable.”
“Even if I do something you cannot understand?”
“Even so.”
“Good enough! Isn’t it delightful to be—conspirators?”
“I don’t kn-ow,” said the lad, doubtfully.
“Pshaw! I just believe you’d like to let the cat out of the bag now!”
“What difference would it make, any way? If I say I’ll do it, I will. I won’t back out.”
“It makes all the difference in the world to me. For once I’m in a Mystery! Right in the very heart of it, spelled with a capital M! Generally I’m ‘only Octave’; now I’m somebody. I have sighed all my life long for a romance or something out of the common; now I’ve attained it. Don’t balk me of my sweet revenge. Think of Paula Pickel’s face when she hears that ‘only Octave,’ was the very identical damsel that went—but no matter! Remember that without me there is no ‘man of science.’”
Melville did remember; and “wild goosey” as the whole affair did appear, even to him, he was so thoroughly in earnest, now, about it, and so uplifted by Octave’s adventurous spirit, that he readily maintained the silence she required.
When, that night, at locking-up-time, Octave had not appeared, and Paula went to the room the sisters shared in common, hoping to find the wild-cap safe in bed, although the sheets had been turned down and then shaken, as if the well-grown lassie could by any possibility be hiding within them, there was great consternation in the household.