say insignificant things in reply. He asked her whether she had had a
good season at Joinville. He would have liked to go in the hunting time,
but could not. He had gone to the Mediterranean, then he had hunted at
Semanville.

"Oh, Monsieur Le Menil," said Miss Bell, "you have wandered on the blue
sea. Have you seen sirens?"

No, he had not seen sirens, but for three days a dolphin had swum in the
yacht's wake.

Miss Bell asked him if that dolphin liked music.

He thought not.

"Dolphins," he said, "are very ordinary fish that sailors call sea-geese,
because they have goose-shaped heads."

But Miss Bell would not believe that the monster which had earned the
poet Arion had a goose-shaped head.

"Monsieur Le Menil, if next year a dolphin comes to swim near your boat,
I pray you play to him on the flute the Delphic Hymn to Apollo. Do you
like the sea, Monsieur Le Menil?"

"I prefer the woods."

Self-contained, simple, he talked quietly.

"Oh, Monsieur Le Menil, I know you like woods where the hares dance in