“Be careful, Dion; you’re insulting a Doric boy!”
“Here—I’ll insult him with a ten-lepta piece.”
“Don’t be mean. Bribe him thoroughly if you’re going to bribe him. We go shooting together again to-morrow evening.”
“Do you indeed?”
“Yes, directly after tea. It’s all arranged. Dirmikis suggested it with the most charming chivalry, and I gave yes for an answer. So we must keep on good terms with him at whatever cost.”
She cocked up her chin and walked exultantly into the tent. A minute afterwards there rang out to the evening a warm contralto voice singing.
Dirmikis looked at the tent and then at Dion with an air of profound astonishment. The quail dropped from his hands, and he did not even snatch at them as he listened to the remarkable sounds which, he could not doubt, flowed from his Amazon. His brows came down over his fiery eyes, and he seemed to stand at gaze like an animal, half-fascinated and half-suspicious. The voice died away and was followed by a sound of pouring water. Then Dirmikis accepted two ten-lepta pieces and picked up the quail. Dion introduced him to the cook, and it was understood that he should be fed in the camp, and that the quail should form part of the evening meal.
Very good they proved to be, cooked in leaves with the addition of some fried slices of fat ham. Rosamund exulted again as she ate them, recognizing the birds she had shot “by the taste.”
“This is one! Aren’t mine different from Dirmikis’s?” she exclaimed. “So much more succulent!”
“Naturally, you great baby!”