“This? ‘Received of Charles Gas-pill-er!’” said she, reading just what the letters of my new name spelled.
How stupid I was! Why had I not told her in so many words, that we were to go, instead of doing the thing in this sensational way?
“Precisely so; that is the French for Glasswood,” I replied, laughing as gaily as my confusion would permit. “I don’t want Frenchmen in Paris to call me Bois de Verre, which means wood made of glass, or anything of that sort. The name is Gas-pee-ay, and not Gas-pill-er.”
“But how does it happen that the receipt is given to you under this name?”
“Because I don’t want to be called Glasswood in Europe. But, my dear, we have no time to spare now, and we shall have ten days of idleness as soon as the steamer sails. So we must not stop to discuss this matter at the present time. We must be on board at half-past twelve, and it is after eleven now,” I continued, with sufficient excitement in my manner to change the current of her thoughts.
“Then we are really going!” exclaimed she, opening her bright eyes.
“Certainly we are; and going immediately.”
“Why, I wanted to go shopping in New York, if we were really going.”
“Shopping! That’s absurd! Ladies never go shopping in New York, when they are on their way to Paris.”
“But I must write a letter to mother.”