“I suppose it was a bit of bounding, after all. But, somehow—well, you wouldn’t just call me a bounder, would you, Letts?”
“Why shouldn’t I call you a bounder, I’d like to know? A bounder is one who bounds, isn’t he?”
“Well, I suppose—but I give you my word, I felt at that moment that it was the most natural thing I could have done—climbing up to the roof of the verandah, and then——”
“And then?”
“Swinging down again, I suppose.”
He was afraid to tell Letts of that practical joke which he had played off on Koomadhi, when he found that the Doctor did not lend himself to that subtle piece of jocularity which Minton said he had conceived when sitting on the roof of the verandah. Letts had been pretty hard on him for having gone so far as to climb up to the roof; but what would he have said if he had been told about that ink-bottle incident?
Minton thought it would, on the whole, be doing himself more ample justice if he were to withhold from Letts all information regarding that ink-bottle business. He said nothing about it, and when Letts mumbled something when in the act of lighting a cigar—something about fellows, who behave like idiots, going home and giving the whole West Coast a bad name, whereas, properly treated, the climate was one of the most salubrious, he remarked confidentially—
“I say, old chap, you needn’t mind jawing to the missus or the Governor about this business; it’s not worth talking about, you know; but they’re both given to exaggerate the importance of such things—Gertrude especially. I’m a bit afraid of her still, I admit: we’ve only been married about three months, you’ll remember.”
“Great Duke! here’s a chap who fancies that as time goes on he’ll get less afraid of his wife,” cried Letts. “Well, well, some chaps do get hallucinations early in life.”
“Don’t say a word about it, Letts. Where’s the good of making a poor girl uneasy?”