“If you will remove the corner of that infernal tin box of yours from my ribs I shall be obliged to you, sir.”
“Your pardon,” I exclaimed, and in my efforts to be accommodating, dropped it on his toe. I will not repeat the remark he made, but I may explain that he was gouty. His son suddenly became afflicted with a sense of the absurdity of the situation. He kicked me on the shin, he even dared to wink, and then began to swell visibly with suppressed laughter. I was in agony, for if he had exploded I do not know what would have happened. Fortunately, at this moment the carriage stopped at the door of a fine office. Without waiting for the footman Mr. Stephen bundled out and vanished into the building—I suppose to laugh in safety. Then I descended with the tin case; then, by command, followed Woodden with the flower, and lastly came Sir Alexander.
“Stop here,” he said to the coachman; “I shan’t be long. Be so good as to follow me, Mr. What’s-your-name, and you, too, Gardener.”
We followed, and found ourselves in a big room luxuriously furnished in a heavy kind of way. Sir Alexander Somers, I should explain, was an enormously opulent bullion-broker, whatever a bullion-broker may be. In this room Mr. Stephen was already established; indeed, he was seated on the window-sill swinging his leg.
“Now we are alone and comfortable,” growled Sir Alexander with sarcastic ferocity.
“As the boa-constrictor said to the rabbit in the cage,” I remarked.
I did not mean to say it, but I had grown nervous, and the thought leapt from my lips in words. Again Mr. Stephen began to swell. He turned his face to the window as though to contemplate the wall beyond, but I could see his shoulders shaking. A dim light of intelligence shone in Woodden’s pale eyes. About three minutes later the joke got home. He gurgled something about boa-constrictors and rabbits and gave a short, loud laugh. As for Sir Alexander, he merely said:
“I did not catch your remark, sir, would you be so good as to repeat it?”
As I appeared unwilling to accept the invitation, he went on:
“Perhaps, then, you would repeat what you told me in that sale-room?”