“Oh, but you must just come in for five minutes, dear. It'll look so funny if you don't. I told 'em we was coming.”
“I would really rather not,” I urged; “some other evening.” I felt a presentiment, I confided to her, that on this particular evening I should not shine to advantage.
“Oh, you mustn't be so shy,” said Miss Sellars. “I don't like shy fellows—not too shy. That's silly.” And Miss Sellars took my arm with a decided grip, making it clear to me that escape could be obtained only by an unseemly struggle in the street; not being prepared for which, I meekly yielded.
We knocked at the door of one of the small houses, Miss Sellars retaining her hold upon me until it had been opened to us by a lank young man in his shirt-sleeves and closed behind us.
“Don't gentlemen wear coats of a hevening nowadays?” asked Miss Sellars, tartly, of the lank young man. “New fashion just come in?”
“I don't know what gentlemen wear in the evening or what they don't,” retorted the lank young man, who appeared to be in an aggressive mood. “If I can find one in this street, I'll ast him and let you know.”
“Mother in the droaring-room?” enquired Miss Sellars, ignoring the retort.
“They're all of 'em in the parlour, if that's what you mean,” returned the lank young man, “the whole blooming shoot. If you stand up against the wall and don't breathe, there'll just be room for you.”
Sweeping by the lank young man, Miss Sellars opened the parlour door, and towing me in behind her, shut it.
“Well, Mar, here we are,” announced Miss Sellars. An enormously stout lady, ornamented with a cap that appeared to have been made out of a bandanna handkerchief, rose to greet us, thus revealing the fact that she had been sitting upon an extremely small horsehair-covered easy-chair, the disproportion between the lady and her support being quite pathetic.