"But the basin's nearly empty," said Pip. "The stuff must have gone somewhere."
"Some of it has gone on the floor," said Pipette truthfully.
At this moment the clock struck one.
"Father will be in soon," said Pip. "We'd better wipe up."
They propped the telephone receiver on the little table between the directory and a bookstand, and cleared up the mess on the floor with a handkerchief—Pipette's. As they finished they heard the brougham drive up.
"It isn't nearly all gone," said Pip gloomily, peering into the receiver. "If we hang it up on its hook the stuff will all fall out. Let's leave it like it is. Father doesn't never use the Terriphone till after lunch, and it will be all gone by then. Come on, Pipette."
The two Samaritans turned their backs upon the telephone and stole out of the room, leaving that sorely tried instrument to digest its unaccustomed luncheon as best it might.
It was Mr. Evans who suffered most. He was sent into the Consulting Room just before dinner to telephone a message to a patient. The telephone stood in a dark corner, and the gas in the room was turned low. Mr. Evans was surprised to find that the receiver, instead of hanging on its hook, was lying on the little table, carefully propped between the directory and a bookstand.
On lifting it up he was surprised by an unwonted feeling of stickiness; but when he held the instrument to the light, the reason revealed itself to him immediately in the form of a dollop of congealed chicken-broth, nicely rounded to the shape of the cup, which shot from its resting-place, with a clammy thud, on to his clean shirtfront, and then proceeded to slide rapidly down inside his dress waistcoat, leaving a snail-like track, dotted with grains of rice, behind it.
Pip was sent supperless to bed, where Pipette, completely broken down by remorse and sisterly affection, voluntarily joined him not much later. The following week they were sent to school.