"Be quiet!" said his father with the brusqueness of the male parent.
But William began to see how things stood. And William liked Mr. Lambkin.
One evening he saw from his window Mr. Gregorius Lambkin walking with Miss Gregoria Mush in Miss Gregoria Mush's garden. Mr. Gregorius Lambkin did not look happy.
William crept down to the hole in the fence and applied his ear to it.
They were sitting on a seat quite close to his hole.
"Gregorius," the President of the Society of Ancient Souls was saying, "when I found that our names were the same I knew that our destinies were interwoven."
"Yes," murmured Mr. Lambkin. "It's so kind of you, so kind. But—I'm afraid I'm overstaying my welcome. I must——"
"No. I must say what is in my heart, Gregorius. You live on the Past, I live in the Past. We have a common mission—the mission of bringing to the thoughtless and uninitiated the memory of their former lives. Gregorius, our work would be more valuable if we could do it together, if the common destiny that has united our nomenclatures could unite also our lives."
"It's so kind of you," murmured the writhing victim, "so kind. I am so unfit, I——"
"No, friend," she said kindly. "I have power enough for both. The human speech is so poor an agent, is it not?"