“Stevie,” says Freckles, “I don't want it.”
“Gosh!” says Stevie, and he went off, shaking his head.
And I was considerable worried myself. I tagged him along home, and he wasn't natural. He went into the house, and I tagged him along in and up to his room, and he took no notice of me, though I'm not supposed to be there at all.
And what do you suppose that kid did?—he went and washed his ears. It was midnight, and there wasn't any one to make him do it, and there wasn't any one to see his ears but me, but he washed 'em careful, inside and out. And then he wet his hair and combed it. First he parted it on one side, and then he parted it x on the other, and then he blushed and parted it in the middle. I was sitting on the floor by the foot of the bed, and he was facing the looking-glass, but I saw the blush because it spread clear around to the back of his neck.
And then he went to the closet and put on his long pants that belonged to his Sunday suit. The looking-glass wasn't big enough so he could see his hair and his long pants all at the same time, but he tilted the glass and squirmed and twisted around and saw them bit by bit. At first I thought maybe he was going out again, even at that time of night, but he wasn't; all he was doing was admiring himself. Just then his father pounded on the wall and asked him if he wasn't in bed yet, and he said he was going. He put the light out right away. But he didn't go to bed. He just sat in the dark with his clean ears and his long pants on and his hair parted in the middle, and several times before I went to sleep myself I heard him sigh and say: “Little Eva! Little Eva's dying! Little Eva!”
He must have got so tired he forgot to undress, staying up that late and everything, for in the morning when his father pounded on the door he didn't answer. I was under the bed, and I stayed there. Pretty soon his father pounded again, and then he came into the room. And there Freckles was lying on the bed with his Sunday pants on and his hair parted in the middle and his ears clean.
“Harold!” says his father, and shook him, “what does this mean?”
Harold is Freckles's other name, but if any one of his size calls him Harold, there will be a fight. He sat up on the bed and says, still sleepy:
“What does what mean, Pa?”
“Your lying there asleep with your clothes on,” says his father..