Page 174 - for-the-term-of-his-natural-life

‘You stupid man! As if I knew! It is your place to talk. Tell
me a fairy story.’
‘‘Jack and the Beanstalk’?’ suggested Frere.
‘Jack and the grandmother! Nonsense. Make one up out
of your head, you know.’
Frere laughed.
‘I can’t,’ he said. ‘I never did such a thing in my life.’
‘Then why not begin? I shall go away if you don’t begin.’
Frere rubbed his brows. ‘Well, have you read—have you
read ‘Robinson Crusoe?’’—as if the idea was a brilliant one.
‘Of course I have,’ returned Sylvia, pouting. ‘Read it?—
yes. Everybody’s read ‘Robinson Crusoe!’’
‘Oh, have they? Well, I didn’t know; let me see now.’ And
pulling hard at his pipe, he plunged into literary reflection.
Sylvia, sitting beside him, eagerly watching for the happy
thought that never came, pouted and said, ‘What a stupid,
stupid man you are! I shall be so glad to get back to papa
again. He knows all sorts of stories, nearly as many as old
Danny.’
‘Danny knows some, then?’
‘Danny!’—with as much surprise as if she said ‘Walter
Scott!’ ‘Of course he does. I suppose now,’ putting her head
on one side, with an amusing expression of superiority, ‘you
never heard the story of the ‘Banshee’?’
‘No, I never did.’
‘Nor the ‘White Horse of the Peppers’?’
‘No.’
‘No, I suppose not. Nor the ‘Changeling’? nor the ‘Lep-
rechaun’?’ ‘No.’

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