If
Stevenson's talk became monologue we did not know it, because
our one object was to show by our attention that he need never
leave off. If thought failed him we would not combat what he
had said, or start some new theme, but would encourage him with a
question; and one felt that it had been always so from childhood
up. His mind was full of phantasy for phantasy's sake and he gave
as good entertainment in monologue as his cousin Robert Louis in
poem or story. He was always 'supposing:' 'Suppose you had two
millions what would you do with it?' and 'Suppose you were in
Spain and in love how would you propose?' I recall him one
afternoon at our house at Bedford Park, surrounded by my brother
and sisters and a little group of my father's friends, describing
proposals in half a dozen countries. There your father did it,
dressed in such and such a way with such and such words, and there
a friend must wait for the lady outside the chapel door, sprinkle
her with holy water and say 'My friend Jones is dying for love of
you.' But when it was over, those quaint descriptions, so full of
laughter and sympathy, faded or remained in the memory as
something alien from one's own life like a dance I once saw in a
great house, where beautifully dressed children wound a long
ribbon in and out as they danced.
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