I shudder every time I
hear it.
MRS. KNOWLE (surprised). What name, Sandy?
MELISANDE. There it is again. Oh, why did you christen me by such a
wonderful, beautiful, magical name as Melisande, if you were going to
call me Sandy?
MRS. KNOWLE. Well, dear, as I think I've told you, that was a mistake
of your father's. I suppose he got it out of some book. I should
certainly never have agreed to it, if I had heard him distinctly. I
thought he said Millicent--after your Aunt Milly. And not being very
well at the time, and leaving it all to him, I never really knew about
it until it was too late to do anything. I did say to your father,
"Can't we christen her again?" But there was nothing in the prayer
book about it except "riper years," and nobody seemed to know when
riper years began. Besides, we were all calling you Sandy then. I
think Sandy is a very pretty name, don't you, Jane?
JANE. Oh, but don't you think Melisande is beautiful, Aunt Mary? I
mean really beautiful.
MRS. KNOWLE. Well, it never seems to me quite respectable, not for a
nicely-brought-up young girl in a Christian house. It makes me think
of the sort of person who meets a strange young man to whom she has
never been introduced, and talks to him in a forest with her hair
coming down.
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