Aphrodite, whose spouse I am!' Thus
will you have honour amongst mortals, being held blameless!"

"Blameless!" cried Leander, in pardonable exasperation. "That's all you
know about it! And what am I to say to the lady it lawfully belongs to?"

"You have lied to me, then, and you are already affianced! Tell me the
abode of this maiden of yours."

"What do you want it for?" he inquired, hoping faintly she might intend
to restore the ring.

"To seek it out, to go to her abode, to crush her! Is she not my rival?"

"Crush my Matilda?" he cried in agony. "You'll never do such a thing as
that?"

"You have revealed her name! I have but to ask in your streets, 'Where
abideth Matilda, the beloved of Leander, the dresser of hair? Lead me to
her dwelling.' And having arrived thereat, I shall crush her, and thus
she shall deservedly perish!"

He was horrified at the possible effects of his slip, which he hastened
to repair. "You won't find it so easy to come at her, luckily," he said;
"there's hundreds of Matildas in London alone."

"Then," said the goddess, sweetly and calmly, "it is simple: I shall
crash them all."

"Oh, lor!" whimpered Leander, "here's a bloodthirsty person! Where's the
sense of doing that?"

"Because, dissipated reveller that you are, you love them."

"Now, when did I ever say I loved them? I don't even know more than two
or three, and those I look on as sisters--in fact" (here he hit upon a
lucky evasion) "they _are_ sisters--it's only another name for them.
I've a brother and three Matildas, and here are you talking of crushing
my poor sisters as if they were so many beadles--all for nothing!"

"Is this the truth? Palter not with me! You are pledged to no mortal
bride?"

"I'm a bachelor. And as for the ring, it belongs to my aunt, who's over
fifty."

"Then no one stands between us, and you are mine!"

"Don't talk so ridiculous! I tell you I ain't yours--it's a free
country, this is!"

"If I--an immortal--can stoop thus, it becomes you not to reject the
dazzling favour."

A last argument occurred to him. "But I reelly don't think, mum," he
said persuasively, "that you can be quite aware of the extent of the
stoop. The fact is, I am, as I've tried to make you understand, a
hairdresser; some might lower themselves so far as to call me a barber.
Now, hairdressing, whatever may be said for it" (he could not readily
bring himself to decry his profession)--"hairdressing is considribly
below yo