“Ach, so!”
The Baron looked at her, and though he boasted of no such inventive gifts as his friend Bunker, his ardent heart bade him rather commit himself to perdition than refuse.
“You will tell it to me?”
“I vill!”
Making as much as possible of the raconteur's privileges of clearing his throat, settling himself into good position, and gazing dreamily at the tree-tops for inspiration, he began in a slow, measured voice—
“In ze pass he stood. Zen gomed his enemies. He fired his gon and shooted some dead. Zen did zey run avay. Zat vas vat happened.”
When he ventured to meet her candid gaze after thus lamely libelling his forefather, he was horrified to observe that she had already recoiled some feet away from him, and seemed still to be in the act of recoiling.
“It would have been kinder to tell me at once that I had asked too much!” she exclaimed in a voice affected by several emotions. “I only wanted to hear you repeat his death-cry as his foes slew him, so that it might always seem more real to me. And you snub me like this!”
The Baron threw himself upon one knee.
“Forgive me! I did jost lose mine head mit your eyes looking so at me! I get confused, you are so lovely! I did not mean to snob!”