Billy wrote that she had decided not
to go to college. She would take up some studies there in Paris, she
said, but she would devote herself more particularly to her music.
When the next summer came there was still something other than America
to claim her attention: the Calderwells had invited her to cruise with
them for three months. Their yacht was a little floating palace of
delight, Billy declared, not to mention the charm of the unknown lands
and waters that she and Aunt Hannah would see.
Of all this Billy wrote to William--at occasional intervals--but she did
not come home. Even when the next autumn came, there was still Paris to
detain her for another long winter of study.
In the Henshaw house on Beacon Street, William mourned not a little as
each recurring season brought no Billy.
"The idea! It's just as if one didn't have a namesake!" he fumed.
"Well, did you have one?" Bertram demanded one day. "Really, Will, I'm
beginning to think she's a myth. Long years ago, from the first of
April till June we did have two frolicsome sprites here that announced
themselves as 'Billy' and 'Spunk,' I'll own. And a year later, by ways
devious and secret, we three managed to see the one called 'Billy' off
on a great steamship. Since then, what? A word--a message--a scrap of
paper. Billy's a myth, I say!"
William sighed.
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