He was not proud of even this, of course.
"Oh! Jus' lig gen-tie bree-zes."
He said that he could not do better than adopt this charming euphemism.
"Also, how ole you gitting ver' soon? "
"Thirty."
A Japanese always adds a few years. She therefore thought him younger, and her veneration abated accordingly. But he was in fact older.
"Tha' 's also nize—ver' nize. I wish I so ole. That Mr. B. F. Pikkerton he lig me more if I older, I thing." She sighed.
"I don't know about that. The American point of view differs." But he would not meddle. "How old are you, pray?"
This was only the proper return for her courtesy. Besides, the consul was enjoying the usually dull game of decorum to-day. The girl was piquant in a most dazzling fashion.
"Me? I 'bout—'bout—"(what he had said made her doubt a little the Japanese idea) '"bout 'mos'— twenty-seven—when the chrysanthemum blooms again."
She was seventeen.
"Yaes, 'bout 'mos' twenty-seven" with a barely perceptible rising inflection.
