"What do you suppose I dreamed?" asked Wake. "You'll never guess."
Inarticulate sounds came from Finch's pillow.
"I dreamed that you were a flower!"
A grunt that weakened into a chuckle. Finch opened an eye. "What sort of flower?"
"Not a very pretty one, I'm afraid." His voice was gently regretful. "I don't know the variety. A long, yellowish sad-looking flower. . . ."
"Hmph."
"But"—gaily—"just crammed with honey!"
"The deuce I was!"
"Yes—and I was a bee! One of those jazzy little brown bees that go gathering"
It was enough. Finch smothered him under a pillow and did not release him until he admitted that he was a liar, a toady, and an altogether filthy little reptile.
No mention was made, while Finch dressed and Wake splashed in the basin, of the ceremony of the night before. In the darkness the figure of Kuan Yin had disappeared, but Wake's sensitive nose was aware of a subtle fragrance in the room, a delicate elation of the spirit as from a lovely half-remembered dream.
It was a morning of swinging white clouds against an ardent blue sky. The thick yellow sunshine was flung on the grey walls of the attic room as though with a brush. More gold than gold it seemed; the sky bluer than blue; the grass and trees more green than ever green had been. That querulous artist Summer, who had given them during her season so many blurred and wanly tinted pictures, now seemed intent on splashing her last colour on the final canvas with furious brilliance.
"What a day," cried Wake, "for going on a visit!
