“James Harrow,” he managed to say, aware of an innocence and directness of thought and speech which were awaking in him faintest responsive echoes. They were the blessed echoes from the dim, fair land of childhood, but he did not know it.
“James Harrow,” she repeated with a friendly nod. “My name is Lissa—my first name; the other is Guilford. My father is the famous poet, Clarence Guilford. He named us all after butterflies—all my sisters”—counting them on her white fingers while her eyes rested on him—“Chlorippe, twelve years old, that pretty one next to my father; then Philodice, thirteen; Dione, fourteen; Aphrodite, fifteen; Cybele, the one next to me, sixteen, and almost seventeen; and myself, seventeen, almost eighteen. Besides, there is Iole, who married Mr. Wayne, and Vanessa, married to Mr. Briggs. They have been off on Mr. Wayne’s yacht, the Thendara, on their wedding trip. Now you know all about us. Do you think you would like to know us?”
“Like to! I’d simply love to! I——”
“That is very nice,” she said unembarrassed.
“I thought I should like you when I saw you leaning over and listening so reverently to father’s epigrams. Then, besides, I had nobody but my sisters to talk to. Oh, you can’t imagine how many attractive men I see every day in New York—and I should like to know them all—and many do look at me as though they would like it, too; but Mr. Wayne is so queer, and so are father and Mr. Briggs—about my speaking to people in public places. They have told me not to, but I—I—thought I would,” she ended, smiling. “What harm can it do for me to talk to you?”
“It’s perfectly heavenly of you——”
“Oh, do you think so? I wonder what father thinks”—turning to look; then, resuming: “He generally makes us stop, but I am quite sure he expected me to talk to you.”
The lone note of a piano broke the thread of the sweetest, maddest discourse Harrow had ever listened to; the girl’s cheeks flushed and she turned expectantly toward the curtained stage. Again the lone note, thumped vigorously, sounded a staccato monotone.
“Precious—very precious,” breathed the poet, closing his eyes in a sort of fatty ecstasy.