"'Soldiers,' isn't it?"
"No—'Sailors.' It was 'Soldiers,' but I like sailors much better than soldiers, so I changed it. I'll sing it now."
"Wait till Sunday," said Robin, with much presence of mind. "Will you not tell me a story?"
This idea appeared so good that Phillis began forthwith.
"Once there were three horses what lived in a stable. Two was wise and one was just a foolish young horse. There was some wolves what lived quite near the stable——"
"Wolves?" said my secretary, in tones of mild surprise.
"The stable," explained Phillis, "stood in the midst of the snowy plains of Muscovy. I should have telled you that before."
"Just so," said Robin gravely. "Go on."
"Well, one day," continued the narratress's voice through the curtains—I knew the story by heart, so I was able to fill up the gaps for myself when she dropped to a confidential whisper—"one cold, windy, berleak day, the old wolves said to the young ones, 'How about a meal of meat?' and all the young one's said, 'Oh, let's!'
"That very morning," continued Phillis in the impressive bass which she reserves for the most exciting parts of her narrative, "that very morning the foolish young horse said to the old horses, 'Who is for a scamper to-day?' Then he began to wiggle and wiggle at his halter. The old horses said, 'There is wolves outside, and our master says that they eat all sheep an' cattle an' horses,' But the young horse just wiggled and wiggled,"—I could hear my daughter suiting the action to the word upon her audience's knee,—"and pwesently his halter was off! Then out he rushed, kicking up the nimble snow with his feathery heels, and—what?"