“Well,” I began, “I shall tell you a story of a Dwainie called Arethusa. Say it after me, Joey. Arethusa.”
“Arethusa,” he repeated painstakingly.
“Arethusa was a nymph. She lived in a place called Arcadia. And she slept on a couch of snow in the Acroceraunian mountains. Don’t interrupt, please, Joey!—”
“I was only trying to say that big word—it’s hard enough to say the name of our own mountains—but Ac—Acro—”
“Never mind. It is not necessary for you to remember all the names in my stories, only the names I ask you to remember.”
“Bell Brandon says you’re teaching me funny that way. She says you’re teaching me stories of the old world before you teach me to speak good English. What’s good English, Mr. David?”
“Never mind, lad,” I murmured confusedly. My wonder woman was quite right, Joey’s English was reprehensible; but I confess I secretly enjoyed it—there was something eminently Joeyish about it—a quaintness that I found irresistible. I smiled, and sighed, and continued, “Arethusa’s hair was rainbow colored, and her eyes were sky blue, and her cheeks coral. Gliding and springing she went, ever singing; you see, she was not only beautiful, but light hearted and pure. The Earth loved her, and the Heaven smiled above her. Now Alpheus was a river-god. He sat very often on a glacier—a cold, cold glacier, and whenever he struck the mountains with his trident great chasms would open, and the whole world about would shake. He saw the Dwainie Arethusa, one day, and as she ran he followed the fleet nymph’s flight to the brink of the Dorian sea.”
“Oh, oh,” breathed my listener, eyes distended, and lips apart. “Did he catch her?”
“He followed her to the brink—the edge, Joey—of the sea. Arethusa cried: ‘Oh, save me! Oh, guide me! And bid the deep hide me, for he grasps me now by the hair—’”
“Her rainbow hair?”