“Why, David,” said I, sitting up, “do you want to come into my bed?”
“Mother said I wasn't to want it unless you wanted it first,” he squeaked.
“It is what I have been wanting all the time,” said I, and then without more ado the little white figure rose and flung itself at me. For the rest of the night he lay on me and across me, and sometimes his feet were at the bottom of the bed and sometimes on the pillow, but he always retained possession of my finger, and occasionally he woke me to say that he was sleeping with me. I had not a good night. I lay thinking.
Of this little boy, who, in the midst of his play while I undressed him, had suddenly buried his head on my knees.
Of the woman who had been for him who could be sufficiently daring.
Of David's dripping little form in the bath, and how when I essayed to catch him he had slipped from my arms like a trout.
Of how I had stood by the open door listening to his sweet breathing, had stood so long that I forgot his name and called him Timothy.
XX. David and Porthos Compared
But Mary spoilt it all, when I sent David back to her in the morning, by inquiring too curiously into his person and discovering that I had put his combinations on him with the buttons to the front. For this I wrote her the following insulting letter. When Mary does anything that specially annoys me I send her an insulting letter. I once had a photograph taken of David being hanged on a tree. I sent her that. You can't think of all the subtle ways of grieving her I have. No woman with the spirit of a crow would stand it.