'I think I startled you by my entrance,' said he, trying to recapture her hand again; but she kept them both resolutely folded before her.
'I was in a reverie, certainly.'
'And, posed as you were, made a most fairy-like picture,' said he, with his head on one side, his long white moustache almost touching her, and more decided tenderness in his tone than he had ever before adopted.
'A fairy—would I were one!' said Alison, a little impatiently, with a flash in her dark blue eyes, for she was in great dread of what might follow now.
'And what would you do if you were one in reality?' said he, passing a hand caressingly round her soft arm.
'Do? As Robin Goodfellow, "the knavish sprite," did.'
'How?'
'By one wave of my wand I should punish you for disturbing me.'
'In what way?' He had interlaced his pudgy fingers on her arm now.
'By garnishing you, as he did, with Bottom's ears,' she replied, with something between a laugh and an angry sigh, 'though I should decline to take the part of either Titania or Peasblossom.'