“You don’t spoze there is any danger of that, do you, Samantha? I would give a dollar bill to tell old Gowdey and Uncle Sime Bentley that I’d interviewed a Syren!” sez he. “It would make me a lion, Samantha, and you a lioness.”
“I shan’t be made any animal whatsoever, Josiah Allen, by follerin’ up a Syren at this time of night. They never did anything but harm, from their grandmothers’ days down, and men have always been fooled and drownded by ’em!” sez I; “you let Syrens alone and come to bed,” sez I; “you’re a perfessor and a grandfather, Josiah Allen, and I’d try to act becomin’ to both on em,” sez I.
He fingered the red tossels lovin’ly.
“Sech a chance,” sez he, “mebby I never shall have agin. I don’t spoze any man who ever parlied with ’em wuz ever so dressy in his appearance, and so stylish—no knowin’ what would come of it!” sez he. He hated to give up the idee.
“Wall,” sez I, “it’s rainin’ as hard as it can; them tossels never would come out flossy and beautiful agin, they would all be limped and squashed down and spilte.”
“Do you think so?” sez he anxiously.
He took off his hat and put down his umbrell, and sez he—“It may be as well to not foller the investigation to-night; there will probble be a chance in fairer weather.”
But the next day we found out that the Syren wuz a thing they fixed onto the fog horn for certain signals, and Josiah felt glad enough that he hadn’t made no moves to talk with her.
I wuz glad on the side of common sense. He on the account of them tossels.
But after we found out what it wuz, and all about it, that fog horn made us feel dretful lonesome and queer when we heard it, half asleep and half awake. It would seem as if one half of our life wuz a-hollerin’ out to the other half.