Page:Zodiac stories by Blanche Mary Channing.pdf/65

48 pink-and-gray kimono, if only he could coax her to pose for him.

"You have not told me yet why you and your sister are hiding in these monster dolphins. Do you live in them? Are you water-sprites?" A Japanese, old or young, is quick to take a joke, and Cherry-Bloom smiled at the suggestion. She only shook her head, however; it was as well not to tell everything. The young man had enough tact not to repeat a question which it was evident his little new acquaintance preferred not to answer. So he tried another method.

"Let us go out into the garden," he said affably; "your sister must be tired of staying in the vase; I will help her out."

Suiting the action to the word, he advanced towards the fish from whose mouth Plum-Blossom's face was now timidly peeping, but she instantly disappeared, and he saw that her fears were by no means allayed. Cherry-Bloom ran up to the fish,