"Why, I came down here to read; and now, look here, I wish you wouldn't keep on calling me Miss Darrell; it sounds as if you were laughing at me. Say Georgia."
"With all my heart. Georgia be it—on one condition."
"Well, what is it?"
"That you call me Charley."
"Of course I'll call you Charley," said Georgia, decidedly; "I intended to all along. You didn't expect I'd say mister, did you?"
"Of course I didn't; I never indulge in absurd expectations. And may I ask the name of the book so fortunate as to find favor in your eyes, Miss Georgia?"
"Well, it's the 'Pilgrim's Progress.' I don't think much of it either—all about a man going on a journey, and getting into all sorts of scrapes. I don't believe it ever happened at all, for my part. And now, as you seem to like taking things easy, I guess I will too; so here we go!" said Georgia, as, shoving the book into her pocket, she made a spring forward, and by some mysterious sleight of hand, only understood by cats, monkeys, sailors, and depraved youths given to mischief, she clambered up the steep side of the high, smooth rock, and perched herself in triumph on the top, like a female Apollo on the apex of Mount Parnassus.
The young gentleman on the sands lifted himself on his elbow and stared at the little girl in a sort of indolent wonder at this energetic proceeding.
"Eh, what? you're up there, are you? May I ask, Miss Georgia, if it is your custom to perch yourself up there, like Patience on a monument, whenever you wish to appreciate the beauties of literature? Oh! the amount of unnecessary trouble people put themselves to in this world! Now why—I simply ask as a matter of courtesy—what possible object can you have in risking your neck in order to be slightly elevated above your fellow-mortals, eh?"
"Just for fun," said Georgia, as standing on one toe she cut a pigeon-wing, at the imminent danger of tumbling off and breaking her neck.