“‘Perhapth, becauth he’th going to all the Thtar-Countrieth,’ said Draco. ‘He couldn’t do that unleth he came here.’
“‘That’s so,’ said Hercules. ‘We’re one of ’em.’
“‘You’re mistaken,’ said Cepheus. ‘He’s heard about the prettiest seven sisters in Starland, and he wants to take his choice of them back with him. You’ll have to polish up your stars, girls, and dance your best for him.’ (That was his idea of a joke!)
“‘Indeed we won’t!’ said Electra, with her nose very high. ‘We care nothing about him.’
“‘No,’ said Alcyone. ‘We won’t do one thing!’
“‘Now, don’t you put nonsense into their heads,’ said Cassiopeia to Cepheus. ‘He’s just coming to be friendly, and because he can; and I think it’s lovely. We are going to do everything possible to give him a fine welcome; and the girls will look just as pretty as they can, to be a credit to us all.’
“‘I wish Merope’s star were brighter,’ said Celeno. ‘Do you think there is anything we could do about it?’
“There was one thing they could do: they could talk! And they began that very minute. It seems hardly possible that people could talk so much about so little! No one had thought before that Merope was not quite as she should be. If her star was faint and vanished when one looked hard at it, that was the way of Merope’s star, and that was all there was about it.
“But now, with the thought of stranger eyes, they began to feel that perhaps it was extraordinary that she should be different from her sisters. And the more they thought and talked about it, the more important it seemed to be.
“Every one had some suggestion to make, except poor Merope herself; she never had given it a thought, and now she declared she didn’t care.