Truly, war seemed far away; and death farther still in this dear Northland of ours. And I fell a-thinking there that if kings could only see this land on such a day, and smell the pinxters, and hear the sweetened whistle of our lark, there would be no war here, no slavery, no strife where liberty and freedom were the very essence of the land and sky.
My Lady Johnson wished to rest; and there was a romance out of France awaiting her in gilt binding in her chamber.
She went, when the board was cleared, linking her arm in Claudia's.
Penelope took up her knitting with a faint smile at me.
"Will you tell me a story to amuse me, sir?" she said in her shy way.
"You shall tell me one," said I.
"I? What story?"
"Some story you have lived."
"I told you all."