"Why, 'cause now, first comes Robin, and then comes Billie, and then comes Tommy, or else Muffins, if you turn the corner—unless he's a girl—and then he's Annie."
"What?" gasped the second voice. "I don't understand."
"Well, then," the first voice answered, wearily, "call him Johnny."
I know at the time the explanation seemed quite clear to me, as it must have been to the second speaker, for the colloquy ended then and there. I might have peeked through the gooseberries and not been discovered, I suppose, but just then I went out shooting flamingoes with a friend of mine, and when I got back, some time that day, the gooseberry-vines were thick with rose-buds. And while I was gone a brook had come—you could hear it plainly on the other side—and I was surprised, I remember, and angry with my aunt Jemima (I never had an Aunt Jemima) for not telling me. I listened awhile to the tinkle-tinkling till presently the burden changed to a
"Tra, la, la,
Tra, la, la,"
over and over, till I said to myself, "These are the Singing Waters the poets hear!" So I tiptoed nearer through the crackling leaves, and touching the rose-vines very deftly for fear of thorns, again I listened. My heart beat faster.
"It is an English linn!" I said, astonished, for there were words to it, English words to that singing rivulet! I could make out "gold" and "rue" and "youth."
"Some woodland secret!" I told myself; so I listened eagerly, scarcely breathing, and little by little, as my ears grew more accustomed to the sounds, I heard the song, not once, but often, each time more clearly than before:
"Many seek a coronet,
Many sigh for gold,
Some there are a-seeking yet—
(Never thought of you, my pet!)
—Now they're passing old.
"Many yearn for lovers true,
Some for sleep from pain,
Seeking laurel, some find rue—
(Oh, they never dreamed of you!)
—Now want youth again.