“When they were eight or nine years old and found a fine, ripe, juicy-plum patch, and while they were picking plums a balloon suddenly appeared over their heads, their first delirious impulse was to leave all and follow the balloon over hill and dale to the very earth’s end.
“But even though a real live balloon went sailing over their heads, they considered this: that some other kids would get our plums that we had found. A balloon was glorious—a balloon was divine—but even so, there was a bland moment in which the thought of some vicious, tow-headed Swede children from over the hill, who would rush in on the plums, came just in time to make the balloon pall on them.
“But,” said my friend Annabel Lee, “by the same token, in talking over the balloon after it had vanished down the sky, there would come another bland moment when the plums would pall upon them—pall completely, and would appear hateful in their eyes for having kept from them the joy of following the divine balloon. That is another aspect of the flat surfaces of things. And they must all come out upon the flat surfaces, willy-nilly.
“And,” said Annabel Lee, glancing at me as my mind was dimly wistful; “not only must they come out upon the flat surfaces of things, but also you and I must come, willy-nilly.
“And since we must come, willy-nilly,” added the lady, “then why not stay out upon the flat surfaces? Certainly ’twill save the trouble of coming next time. Perhaps, however, it’s all in the coming.”
[III
MY FRIEND ANNABEL LEE]
MY FRIEND Annabel Lee never fails to fascinate and confound me.