"But you broke the rules. Anybody can believe anything if he can break all the rules."
"I'd a dreadful time showing you that I meant to."
I shall not detail a conversation that could have but little interest to others. Indeed, I remember it but poorly. I only know that it seemed magically to feed upon itself, yet waxed to little substance for the memory.
One thing, however, I retain vividly enough. In a moment when we both were silent, renewing our amazement at the stars, there burst upon the night a volume of song that I instantly identified.
"She sleeps, my lady sleeps!" sang the clear tenor of Arthur Updyke. "My lady sleeps—she sleeps!" sang three other voices in well-blended corroboration; after which the four discoursed upon this interesting theme.
We were down from the stars at once, but I saw nothing to laugh at, and said as much.
"We might take them out some sandwiches and things to drink," persisted my Little Miss.
But the starlight had shown me a gleam in her eyes that was too outrageously Peavey.
"We will not" I chanted firmly to the music's mellowed accompaniment. "I am free to say now that the thing must be stopped, but you shall do it less brutally—to-morrow or next day."
"Oh, well, if you—"