Lovegood chuckled ironically:
“But shear the glory from him tenderly, deftly,” said he. “You’re not cutting a hedge. Set aside each lock that falls, that the hero-worshipper may wear a snippet from a poet’s brow.... All the dear delightful barmaids will want a lock. Peckham tea-parties will thrill at the touch of it—Clapham culture sob—West Kensington be troubled. And in the town I can hear all the little coffee-girls a-weeping.... Pan is not dead. The news is worse than that—Pan is growing bald and middle-aged.... Poets should be heard, not seen.”
Rippley dropped the scissors and whipped into a seat, uttering a smothered guffaw, as Aubrey roused and yawned.
Lovegood sat down:
“Silence,” said he—“the sleeping beauty wakes.”
The poet opened his eyes drowsily, and rose slowly, sleepily, from the sofa, amidst a tense silence.
As he stood up, his hair raggedly clipped about his head, making his long neck inordinately naked, a titter ran round the guests.
He shivered:
“I dreamed,” he said; and ran his hand over his hair.
“I dreamed——”