Then he left the room, and, on his way, stumbled over a chair, as he usually did at the dramatic moments in his life.
John was standing in the open doorway, Lucius’s umbrella in his hand. “I think I hear a car coming, old fellow,” he said.
“Got to get my hat,” Mr. Allen muttered. He had been reminded of something; a small straw hat, with a blue ribbon round it, was upon the table, and he fumbled with it a moment before seizing his own and rushing for the door at the increasing warning of a brass gong in the near distance. Thus, when he had gone, a silver dollar was pocketed within the inside band of the small straw hat with the blue ribbon. . . . John Thomas, returning in sharp trepidation to the lovely, miserable figure in the library, encountered one of the many surprises of his life.
“He never could tell the truth to save his life!” she said. “He doesn’t know what truth means! Did you hear him sitting up there and telling us he was ‘an only child’? He has a brother and four sisters living, and I don’t know how many dead!”
“You don’t mean it!” said John, astounded. “That certainly was pecu——”
He lost his breath at that moment. She rose and threw her arms round him with the utmost heartiness. “He’s such an old smart Aleck!” she cried, still weeping. “That’s why I married you instead of him. I love you for not being one! If you want to spank Luddie for telling that story about his wrist I wish you’d go and wake him up and do it!”
“No,” said John. “Lucius called to me as he was running for the car that he’s going to be married next week. I’ll wait and spank one of his children. They’ll be the worst spoiled children in the world!”
LADIES’ WAYS
TWO young people, just out of college and pleasing to the eye, ought to appreciate the advantage of living across the street from each other: but Miss Muriel Eliot’s mood, that summer, was so advanced and intellectual that she found all round about her only a cultural desert, utterly savourless. This was her own definition of her surroundings, and when she expressed herself thus impressively to Mr. Renfrew Mears, the young gentleman who lived directly opposite her, he was granted little choice but to suppose himself included among the unspiced vacancies she mentioned. “The whole deadly environment crushes me,” she told him, as they paused at her gate on returning from a walk. “This town is really a base thing.”