"No, indeed. And where are you going so fast, as if those wooden shoes of
yours were sandals of Mercury?"
"Mercury--is that a shoemaker?"
"No, my dear. He did a terrible bit of cobbling once, when he made
Woman. But he did not shoe her feet with swiftness that I know of; she
only runs away to be run after, and if you do not pursue her, she comes
back--always."
Bebee did not understand at all.
"I thought God made women," she said, a little awe-stricken.
"You call it God. People three thousand years ago called it Mercury or
Hermes. Both mean the same thing,--mere words to designate an unknown
quality. Where are you going? Does your home lie here?"
"Yes, onward, quite far onward," said Bebee, wondering that he had
forgotten all she had told him the day before about her hut, her garden,
and her neighbors. "You did not come and finish your picture to-day: why
was that? I had a rosebud for you, but it is dead now."
"I went to Anvers. You looked for me a little, then?"
"Oh, all day long. For I was so afraid I had been ungrateful."
"That is very pretty of you.
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