From this pleasant reverie both musician and listener were suddenly roused by little Emma, who, raising her head and shaking back the long ringlets from her face, exclaimed,
"Oh, sister, hear that! There goes the champagne, and I am so hungry. Come, let us go to dinner."
"Excuse me, madam," exclaimed the stranger, ceasing to play and springing to his feet, "your beautiful little monitor is right. I was already forgetting myself and venturing to dream as of old;" and he offered his arm to Hortensia, with that polite freedom not only permitted, but enjoined, by the etiquette of the pic-nic.
"And do you call it forgetfulness to dream?" inquired Hortensia.
"With so fair a reality before me, yes; but at other times to dream is to live."
"Oh, yes, it is nice to dream!" broke in the little Emma. "Almost as nice as a wedding. Now last night I dreamt that you were married, Haughty, like sister Alice."
A lambent rosy flame seemed to envelop for an instant the beautiful Hortensia, disappearing instantly, yet leaving its scarlet traces on cheek and brow.
"What say you, my pretty one," said the stranger, patting the lovely child upon the head, "what say you to a sandwich and a glass of wine with me, here on the greensward? (They had now approached the table—if a snow-white damask spread upon the velvet grass, and loaded with tempting viands could be called so.) Is not that better than dreams?"
"I love wine, sir, but mamma and sister say I shouldn't drink it, because it makes my eyes red. Now your eyes are as bright as stars. Do you drink wine?"
It was the stranger's turn to blush. And this little childish prattle seemed to have removed the barrier of strangership from between the two young people, who exchanged glances of a sort of merry vexation, and seemed to understand each other as if they were old friends.