'
'Call me Eve,' says she.
'Well, no,' said I, 'not Eve, anything but that: for _my_ name is Adam,
and if I called you Eve, that would be simply absurd, and we do not want
to be ridiculous in each other's eyes. But I will call you anything else
that you like.'
'Call me Leda,' says she.
'And why Leda?' said I.
'Because Leda sounds something like Clodagh,' says she, 'and you are
al-leady in the habit of calling me Clodagh; and I saw the name Leda in
a book, and liked it: but Clodagh is most hollible, most bitterly
hollible!'
'Well, then,' said I, 'Leda it shall be, and I shan't forget, for I like
it, too, and it suits you, and you ought to have a name beginning with
an "L." Good-night, my dear, sleep well, and dream, dream.'
'And to you, too, my God give dleams of peace and pleasantness,' says
she; and I went.
And it was only when I had lain myself upon leaves for my bed, my head
on my caftan, a rill for my lullaby, and two stars, which alone I could
see out of the heavenful, for my watch-lights; and only when my eyes
were already closed toward slumber, that a sudden strong thought pierced
and woke me: for I remembered that Leda was the name of a Greek woman
who had borne twins.
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