"You as much as said it. Spoof may have advantages—I admit his travel, and all that—but will those things keep him big? Won't section Two bound him in a year or so, just as you say Fourteen bounds me now? Is he different clay; less ox, more soul?"
"Section Two can never hold Spoof, because he—because he is big, don't you see? He reads, he thinks, he sings, he dreams. No section can hold one who does those things."
"Does he write poetry?" I inquired, innocently.
"I—I don't think so," said she, not scenting my trap, "but he is very fond of it. You should hear him read——"
"Hear him read 'Come to me. . . . . Spoof!'"
She turned to me fairly again. She had withdrawn her hands from mine and was crushing little crusts of snow between her mittens. Now she dropped the snow, shook her hands free of its powdery residue, then linked them about her knee. For a long moment she held me under her eyes without blinking.
"So you saw that, did you?"
"Jean—I'm sorry. I apologize. I saw it by accident—I couldn't help that. I could have helped speaking about it. I apologize."
Then her eyes dropped. "It was very foolish," she murmured. "You have a right to be amused."
"But I'm not amused," I protested. "And I'm not sure it is really foolish. At any rate, I'll confess something, Jean; when I found it I tried to write a poem—to you—but I couldn't. The only rhymes I could think of were Jean and bean."