"Oh, I know, I can solve the riddle now. Your years are different, of course, like everything else in this latitude. A month is called a year with you, and that would make you, let me see—how much is twelve times thirty-one? Oh, hang it, nearly five hundred, I should think. Why am I such a duffer at mental arithmetic! It is just the contrary—how many twelves in thirty-one? About two and a half in round numbers, and that's absurd, as you are not a baby. Oh, I have it: your seasons are called years, of course—why didn't I see it before! No, that would make you only seven and a half. Ah, yes, I see it now: a year means two years, or two of your years—summer and winter—mean a year; and that just makes you sixteen, exactly what I had imagined. Is it not so, Yoletta?"
"I do not know what you are talking about, Smith; and I am not listening."
"Well, listen for one moment, and tell me how long does a year last?"
"It lasts from the time the leaves fall in the autumn until they fall again; and it lasts from the time the swallows come in spring until they come again."
"And seriously, honestly, you are thirty-one years old?"
"Did I not tell you so? Yes, I am thirty-one years old."
"Well, I never heard anything to equal this! Good heavens, what does it mean? I know it is awfully rude to inquire a lady's age, but what am I to do? Will you kindly tell me Edra's age?"
"Edra? I forget. Oh yes; she is sixty-three."
"Sixty-three! I'll be shot if she's a day more than twenty-eight! Idiot that I am, why can't I keep calm! But, Yoletta, how you distress me! It almost frightens me to ask another question, but do tell me how old your father is?"
"He is nearly two hundred years old—a hundred and ninety-eight, I think," she replied.