“There’s your tea,” she cut us short; “drink it—if you ain’t drownded an’ your shades settin’ here instead.”
Pelleas looked up bravely.
“I’m not sure about myself, Nichola,” he said gently; “one never is sure about one’s self, you know. But this lady is real, I do assure you!”
“And this, Nichola,” said I, gayly, “I protest is a real gentleman!”
On which we two laughed in each other’s eyes; and Nichola, that grim old woman, said sharply:—
“Our Lady knows you talk enough nonsense to be new-married, the both.”
She clicked the portière rings, like little teeth. And at her words Pelleas and I looked at each other in abashment. Does all the world, like Nichola, guess at our long honeymoon?
VII
THE OTHER TWO
Pelleas has a little niece who when she sits in my room in the sun combing her brown hair looks like a mermaid. I told her this when on the morning after our return from the seashore she arrived to make us a visit and came to sit in my sunny window with her hair all about her shoulders drying from its fragrant bath.