I looked up, startled from my mood. There, hands upon his hips and scowling, stood—the chauffeur!
I frowned, but the fellow just moved nearer.
"I guess mamma's baby don't feel so spry this morning!" he jeered. "Does its little heady-cums ache-ums—eh?"
I grunted rather wearily. "If it does, my good fellow, it's none of your business. Don't bother me!" I shifted the other way.
"Oh, isn't it?"—his tone quickened truculently—"Well, maybe I'll make it my business!" He jerked his arm at me, continuing sharply: "Look here, you glass-eyed monkey-jack, don't you get flip with me this morning"—he laughed coarsely—"or I'll think you want some more! Do you?"
I turned my head and, polishing my monocle carefully, gave it a tight screw and took him in slowly, beginning with his yellow mop of hair and ending with the toes of his soiled canvas shoes. By Jove, I was sure they'd never been whitened since he bought them.
I seemed to anger him. He uttered a sort of snort with a mutter uncomplimentary and strode forward, towering above me where I sat.
"Answer, when I'm talking to you, you sap-headed fool," he bellowed, "or I'll wring your neck! I asked if you wanted some more."
I stretched my arms, trying their muscle room in a lengthy yawn, and blinked at him with my free eye, wondering where the deuce he got the crimson hat band. By Jove, that was the most dashed impertinent thing of all!
"More what?" I drawled indifferently.