“I think I’m going in.”
“Oh, why?”
“Because,” Madame Ruiz repressed a yawn, “because, dear, I feel armchairish.”
With a kiss of the finger tips (decidedly distinguished hands had Vittorio Ruiz), he turned away.
Joying frankly in excess, the fiery noontide hour had a special charm for him.
It was the hour, to be sure, of “the Fawn!”
“Aho, Ahi, Aha!” he carolled, descending half-trippingly a few white winding stairs, that brought him upon a fountain. Palms, with their floating fronds, radiating light, stood all around.
It was here “the creative mood” would sometimes take him, for he possessed no small measure of talent of his own.
His Three Hodeidahs, and Five Phallic Dances for Pianoforte and Orchestra, otherwise known as “Suite in Green,” had taken the whole concert world by storm, and, now, growing more audacious, he was engaged upon an opera to be known, by and by, as Sumaïa.