“My name is Lydia,” persisted the girl. “What letter should it begin with?”
“Oh—oh, I knew Lydia began with an L,” stammered Staniford, “but I—I—I thought your first name was—”
“What?” asked Lydia sharply.
“I don't know. Lily,” he answered guiltily.
“Lily Blood!” cried the girl. “Lydia is bad enough; but Lily Blood! They couldn't have been such fools!”
“I beg your pardon. Of course not. I don't know how I could have got the idea. It was one of those impressions—hallucinations—” Staniford found himself in an attitude of lying excuse towards the simple girl, over whom he had been lording it in satirical fancy ever since he had seen her, and meekly anxious that she should not be vexed with him. He began to laugh at his predicament, and she smiled at his mistake. “What is the date?” he asked.
“The 15th,” she said; and he wrote under the sketch, Lydia Blood. Ship Aroostook, August 15, 1874, and handed it to her, with a bow surcharged with gravity.
She took it, and regarded the picture without comment.
“Ah!” said Staniford, “I see that you know how bad my sketch is. You sketch.”
“No, I don't know how to draw,” replied Lydia.