Obadiah didn’t object when I took hold of his arm. Our clothes sounded crinkly and crackly like as we walked ... but somehow I was a lot warmer than I had been. And I was just getting to the place where I could begin to see how funny everything was. When we got to the corner I couldn’t hold it in any longer. I busted right out laughing.
“Wh-what’s the m-m-matter?” asked Obadiah, alarmed.
“Something tickles me,” I said, laughing some more as I helped him up his front steps.
“Y-y-you’re h-h-hysterical ... th-th-that’s what’s the m-m-matter,” he said, getting excited, “Y-y-your condition’s s-s-serious!”
Nothing must do but that I come in while his mother calls the doctor and my folks and runs around like a Japanese coolie laying out dry clothes for both of us and pouring hot water in the tub.
When I saw the outfit Mrs. Tucker had put out for me to wear I had another fit of laughing which Obadiah thought would send me into convulsions.
A suit of flannel underwear with the shirt and drawers separate; an old pair of long pants, which Mrs. Tucker said would warm my legs up; and a cast-off smoking jacket which had belonged to Mr. Tucker before he got a new one last Christmas—that hung around me like a lean-to tent. Maybe I didn’t look like the cat’s moustache!
Well—the doctor finally got there and after examining Obadiah he advised a brisk rubbing and plenty of hot drinks and hot water bottles ... but said he didn’t think there’d be any ill effects as the victim had stood the shock better than the victim had expected.
“I wish you’d look after poor Ralph. He’s propped up in the chair out there,” I heard Obadiah say in a disappointed voice. “I think he’s even worse off than I am!”
The doc came out and gave me the once over. He looked as though he couldn’t believe his eyes. I was sitting with my legs stuck out over another chair so that the ends of the trousers hung empty like I didn’t have any feet. I didn’t have any arms either ... and the sleeves to the coat hung like they do from a hanger. Then there was nothing under my coat but the underwear which fitted around my neck as loose as a horse collar.