The poet sat up briskly and looked hard at Harrow.
“Your—your friend?” he began—“doubtless associated with you in the high——”
“We are inseparable,” said Harrow calmly, “in the busy marts.”
The sweetness of the poet’s smile was almost overpowering.
“To discuss this sudden—ah—condition which so—ah—abruptly confronts a father, I can not welcome you to my little home in the
wild—which I call the House Beautiful,” he said. “I would it were possible. There all is quiet and simple and exquisitely humble—though now, through the grace of my valued son, there is no mortgage hanging like the brand of Damocles above our lowly roof. But I bid you welcome in the name of my son-in-law, on whom—I should say, with whom—I and my babes are sojourning in this clamorous city. Come and let us talk, soul to soul, heart to heart; come and partake of what simples we have. Set the day, the hour. I thank you for understanding me.”
“The hour,” replied Harrow, “will be about five P.M. on Monday afternoon.... You see, we are going out now to—to——”
“To marry each other,” whispered Lissa with all her sweet fearlessness. “Oh, dear! there goes that monotonous piano and we’ll be blocking people’s view!”
The poet tried to rise upon his great flat feet, but he was wedged too tightly; he strove to speak, to call after them, but the loud thumping notes of the piano drowned his voice.
“Chlorippe! Dione! Philodice! Tell them to stop! Run after them and stay them!” panted the poet.