"And so, I have been in Arcadia—only three weeks! I have known Anthea only twenty-one days! A ridiculously short time, as time goes,—in any other place but Arcadia,—and yet sufficient to lay for ever, the—er—Haunting Spectre of the Might Have Been. Lord! what a preposterous ass I was! Baxter was quite right,—utterly, and completely right! Now, let us suppose that this paragraph had read: 'To-day, at St. George's, Hanover Square, Anthea Devine to—' No no,—confound it!" and Bellew crumpled up the paper, and tossed it into a distant corner. "I wonder what Baxter would think of me now,—good old faithful John. The Haunting Spectre of the Might Have Been,—What a preposterous ass!—what a monumental idiot I was!"
"Posterous ass, isn't a very pretty word, Uncle Porges,—or continental idiot!" said a voice behind him, and turning, he beheld Small Porges somewhat stained, and bespattered with ink, who shook a reproving head at him.
"True, nephew," he answered, "but they are sometimes very apt, and in this instance, particularly so."
Small Porges drew near, and, seating himself upon the arm of Bellew's chair, looked at his adopted uncle, long, and steadfastly.
"Uncle Porges," said he, at last, "you never tell stories, do you?—I mean—lies, you know."
"Indeed, I hope not, Porges,—why do you ask?"
"Well,—'cause my Auntie Anthea's 'fraid you do."
"Is she—hum!—Why?"
"When she came to 'tuck me up,' last night, she sat down on my bed, an' talked to me a long time. An' she sighed a lot, an' said she was 'fraid I didn't care for her any more,—which was awful' silly, you know."
"Yes, of course!" nodded Bellew.