"Delilah thought this latter sounded strangely like Lilith—but perhaps in some subtle way a pirate was like an actress, and so must need be described in the same terms.
"'And Delilah,' said her father, 'what shall you be—what kind of clothes are you going to wear?'
"Delilah had before tried the experiment of relating her ambition to the assembled family, and the result had been bad. The high laughter of Lilith and LePage always rose on the still evening air, and even her father, who was a kind person, would smile. Delilah's ambition was always the same, but she nearly always varied it a little at each telling—and the amusement evinced by her sister and brother varied accordingly.
"Sometimes they even flapped their wings.
"Which was too cruel.
