The musician was not fond of children, and he always imagined his own was going to break his neck or damage himself in some way every time he came into the room. Sonny on his part had his own views concerning this mysterious daddy who came and went so strangely, and who was always going to chastise him severely according to Mrs. Haxtell, but never did anything worse than bring him sweets, and hold him by his sash until he was nearly suffocated.
"And now for my story, daddy," he shouted, with his mouth full of sugar-plums. "Be quick please, my daddy; once upon a time--go on, daddy!"
"Once upon a time," began the musician vaguely, and his thoughts strayed away to the lithesome figure swaying to and fro on the broken wall, and he tried hard to realize his crestfallen condition now that she had refused him.
"Yes, daddy, yes; go on, please, my daddy: are you forgotten the end of my story, daddy dear?" pleaded the restless spirit in his arms.
"Oh, dear, once upon a time there was--there was--oh, confound it all, there was a beautiful lady, wasn't there?" he began wearily.
"Oh," solemnly, "and what sort of daddy did she have?"
"Eh, what? Daddy? Oh--she didn't have one," said the musician, oblivious of morality; he was going through an eloquent speech in his mind which he might have said in the castle meadow if only he had not been so absurdly nervous.
"Oh," said the baby voice, growing shrill with interest, "didn't she never have no daddy at all?"
Of course, thought the musician, if he had said that to her instead of stuttering over a few commonplaces she would have found him irresistible at once.
"Daddy, _dear_," implored Sonny, tugging at his coat suggestively.
"Oh, the devil take the story!" shouted the musician; "didn't I tell you she never had a daddy? Don't ask so many questions, Sonny."
The big blue eyes became tearful at the unusual tone of anger and at the untimely end of the story, and Digby's conscience smote him a little.
"I aren't crying, only little girls cry," gasped the child between his hardly suppressed sobs. "I was only just thinking, daddy, what a welly funny booful lady she were, daddy."
"Yes, my son," said the musician, very much in the tone of respect he would have used to a man of his own age who was battling with some terrible grief, "yes, my son, she was a very funny beautiful lady, so funny that daddy could not understand her at all, although he loved her so much. And she laughed at daddy, and wouldn't be kind to him, though she was kind to the whole world besides."