"But that's not the worst of it," he continued, shaking his head gloomily; "she didn't come to 'tuck me up' an' kiss me good-night like she always does. I lay awake hours an' hours waiting for her, you know; but she never came, an' so I've left her!"
"For ever an' ever!" he said, nodding a stern brow. "I 'specks she'll be awfull' sorry some day."
"I'm thinking of Persia!" he said darkly.
"It's nice an' far, you know, an' I might meet Aladdin with the wonderful lamp."
"Alas, Imp, I fear not," I answered, shaking my head; "and besides, it will take a long, long time to get there, and where shall you sleep at night?"
The Imp frowned harder than ever, staring straight before him as one who wrestles with some mighty problem; then his brow cleared and he spoke in this wise:
"Henceforth, Uncle Dick, my roof shall be the broad expanse of heaven, an'--an'--wait a minute!" he broke off, and, lugging something from his pocket, disclosed a tattered, paper-covered volume (the Imp's books are always tattered), and hastily turning the pages, paused at a certain paragraph and read as follows:
"'Henceforth my roof shall be the broad expanse of heaven, an' all tyrants shall learn to tremble at my name!' Doesn't that sound fine, Uncle Dick? I tried to get Ben--you know, the gardener's boy--to come an' live in the 'greenwood' with me a bit and help to make 'tyrants' tremble, but he said he was 'fraid his mother might find him some day, an' he wouldn't, so I'm going to make them tremble all by myself, unless you will come an' be Little-John, like you were once before--oh, do!"
Before I could answer, hearing footsteps, I looked round, and my heart leaped, for there was Lisbeth coming down the path.
Her head was drooping, and she walked with a listless air. Now, as I watched I forgot everything but that she looked sad, and troubled, and more beautiful than ever, and that I loved her. Instinctively I rose, lifting my cap. She started, and for the fraction of a second her eyes looked into mine, then she passed serenely on her way. I might have been a stick or stone for all the further notice she bestowed.
Side by side, the Imp and I watched her go, until the last gleam of her white skirt had vanished amid the green. Then he folded his arms and turned to me.