“Oh, man,” he cried, snatching his fingers to his ears as if I blasphemed, “are ye not feared?”
“No, I’m not,” I declared, truly enough; “what for should I be feared? Of a lassie? Tell a lassie—that ye—that ye——”
“No, no,” cried Fred Esquillant, “not again!”
“Well, then, that ye ‘like’ her—we will let it go at that. She will want ye to say the other, but at least that will do to begin on. And come, tell me now, what’s to hinder ye, Fred?”
“Oh, everything,” he said; “it’s just fair shameless the way folk can bring themselves to speak openly of suchlike things!”
“And where would you have been, my lad, if once on a day your faither had not telled your mither that she was bonny?”
“I don’t know, and as little do I care,” he cried.
“Well, then,” said I, “there’s Amaryllis—what about her?”
“That’s Latin,” said Fred, waving his arm.
“And there’s Ruth, and the lass in the Song of Solomon!”