Her seriousness enchanted him—her youthful grace as she bent slightly above him, one warning finger uplifted as when a nurse speaks of mysteries to a child in the quiet of twilight.
"Join hands with me in spirit, and I'll try to lead you," she said.... "Now, follow me, while we make our way through the throng of strange faces, treading a path silently, discreetly, avoiding this pretty girl with her bright brown eyes."
"Christine," he thought, and started to speak.
"Hush!" she cautioned him; "for we mustn't speak yet—not until we're in the land of yesterday.... And we are passing over the minutes and hours and days and weeks—and it's like treading on formless mist; so hold tightly to my hand, and follow me—through a golden ballroom, around a great gilded piano, then out into the June rain, Jim.... Have you let go my hand?"
"No."
"Then we are very near the land of yesterday.... I thought I heard a starling whistle. Surely! and there is the sunset over the river—and now we are in the house, Jim. And it is not sunset, after all; it is sunrise—the sunburst of Japan! And there, against it——"
"You!" he said in a voice not very firm.
"Hush! Those two figures we see are only phantoms. Let us stand here by the door and listen to what they might have said."
"They did say things!"
"Ah! but it is to what they might have said that we must try to listen. Be very silent, now. Look at that girl in her silk and sandals and the flowers in her hair! Look at that young fellow, rooted to the floor, amazed at the apparition! Can you hear what he might have said to her in his astonishment?"