uch!"

"What! you dare to upbraid me?" she cried. "Beware, or I----"

"I know," said Leander, flinching from her. "Don't do that; I only made
a remark."

"I have the right to follow you; I choose to do so."

"If you must, you must," he groaned; "but it does seem hard that I
mayn't slip out for a few minutes' talk with my only sister."

"You said you were going to run for business, and you told me you had
three sisters."

"So I have; but only one _youngest_ one."

"And why did they not all come to talk with you?"

"I suppose because the other two stayed at home," rejoined Leander,
sulkily.

"I know not why, but I doubt you; that one who came, she is not like
you!"

"No," said Leander, with a great show of candour, "that's what every one
says; all our family are like that; we are like in a way, because we're
all of us so different. You can tell us anywhere just by the difference.
My father and mother were both very unlike: I suppose we take after
them."

The goddess seemed satisfied with this explanation. "And now that I have
regained you, let us return to your abode," she said; and Leander walked
back by her side, a prey to rage and humiliation.

"It is a miserable thing," he was thinking, "for a man in my rank of
life to have a female statue trotting after him like a great dorg. I'm
d----d if I put up with it! Suppose we happen on somebody as knows me!"

[Illustration: "IT IS A MISERABLE THING," HE WAS THINKING, "FOR A MAN
... TO HAVE A FEMALE STATUE TROTTING AFTER HIM LIKE A GREAT DORG."]

Fortunately, at that time of night Bloomsbury Square is not much
frequented; the increasing fog prevented the apparition of a female in
classical garments from attracting the notice to which it might
otherwise have been exposed, and they reached the shop without any
disagreeable encounter.

"She shan't stop in the saloon," he determined; "I've had enough of
that! If you've no objections," he said, with a mixture of deference and
dictation, "I shall be obliged if you'd settle yourself in the little
shrine in the upstairs room before proceeding to evaporate out of your
statue; it would be more agreeable to my feelings."

"Ah!" she said, smiling, "you would have me nearer you? Your stubborn
heart is yielding; a little while, and you will own the power of
Aphrodite!"

"Now, don't you go deceiving yourself with any such ideers," said the
hairdresser, irritably. "I shan't do no such thing, so you needn't think
it. An