“Oh, Philip,” whispered Patty, in a quaking voice, “it’s a mouse! an awful mouse!”
“Well, what are you going to do about it?” and Philip folded his arms, and stood gazing at the pretty, frightened figure on the chair back.
His amused calm quieted Patty’s nerves, which had really been put on edge by her uncontrollable aversion to mice, and she returned, cheerfully, “I suppose I shall have to stay up here the rest of my life, unless you can attack and vanquish the fearsome brute.”
“I shall not even try,” said Philip, coolly, as he turned to throw away his cigar, “because I like to see you sitting up there. However, as there may be danger of another attack from the enemy, and as this chair is almost entirely unoccupied, I shall camp out here at your feet, and keep guard over your safety.”
He seated himself on the arm of the same chair, while Patty sat on its low, cushioned back. She drew her blue gown more closely about her, and cast wary glances toward the corner, where the enemy was presumably encamped.
“I think perhaps the danger is over,” she said. “And if you’ll go back to the smoking-room, I will make a brave effort to get away unharmed.”
“Watch me go,” said Philip, showing no signs of moving. “However, if it will set your mind at rest, I’ll tell you that it wasn’t a mouse. I don’t believe they have such things in this well-regulated household.”
“But I saw it!” declared Patty, positively.
“Saw a mouse?”
“Well, not exactly that, but I saw that little tassel on the portière wiggle, so it must have been a mouse.”