You will have to be extra charming to substantiate them." Before Mrs.Cricklander went to bed, she called Arabella Clinker into her room.
"Arabella," she said, "who was Cheiron ?" But she pronounced the "ei" as an "a," so Miss Clinker replied without any hesitation: "He was a boatman who carried the souls of the dead over the River Styx, and to whom they were obliged to pay an obolus--son of Erebus and Nox.
He is represented as an old man with a hideous face and long white beard and piercing eyes." "Is there anything else I ought to know about him ?" her employer asked, and Arabella thought for a moment.
"There is the story of Hercules not showing the golden bow.

Er--it is a little complicated and has to do with the superstitions of the ancients--er--something Egyptian, I think, for the moment--I will look it up to-morrow.

I can't say offhand." "Thanks, Arabella.

Good night." And it was not until after the party of four had started next morning that Miss Clinker suddenly thought, with a start: "She may have been alluding to quite the other Cheiron--the Centaur--and in that case I have given her some wrong lights!".