"What a funny man you are," she exclaimed, laughing merrily, as she threw her arms round his neck in the foreign way she had needed small prompting to learn. "You are not a hermit yet; ai ya, you pitiable fellow, to be so heavily burdened with women!"
Herrick, like Nancy, was content to postpone his dreams of the monastery.
Not to forget them, however. When a chance offered, he called for Nancy in order to question her. He had never discussed marriage with the girl; it was not the custom for a father to mention such subjects to his daughter. But to raise the question in English seemed excusable. So the man, seeking help from Nancy herself on the difficult problem of her future, found she listened decorously in the Western tongue to matters she would have blushed to hear, had they been proposed to her in Chinese.
"They tell me you wish to be a nun," said the father, smiling while he spoke.
"I made some undutiful remarks," acknowledged the girl, afraid her father would laugh at the enormity of her desire. "I cannot go against my father's wishes."
"Very properly said," exclaimed Herrick, not really at ease in his role of a Confucian father. He had not been born to it. He could never quite believe Nancy's filial attitude was genuine; the words, sounding so odd in English, were like speeches rehearsed for a play. He at least was consciously theatrical, when he answered them. "Very properly said," he approved, "but a father's wishes are those which will make his daughter happy."
This was the way he expressed himself, solemn words comporting the dignity of a parent, though what he really would have given worlds to say was, "Kiss me, child; sit on my knee, rub your hands through my hair, and let's stop pretending we're grown-ups. We've years before we need bother over a frivolous subject like marriage." Alas, the Confucian canons did not permit such playfulness.
"I have been thinking about your marriage," Herrick went on, stumbling pitifully for words after this regretful glimpse of all the demonstrative pleasantries of affection he had lost. "It is time we considered these things."
Nancy became visibly paler.
"These are new times, new manners," he said, momentarily homesick for the schooldays when he first learned the phrase in its noble classical context—how long, long ago that was! Who would have thought he would be quoting it to this strange dark-haired daughter! "New times, new manners. Formerly we arranged these things early"—he was the Chinese father now—"and we looked for peace only when our daughters were safely married. We are a better generation, Nancy, better in a few things at least, and we want peace for our daughters too, not merely selfish peace for ourselves."