“Yes?”
“If the lessons are done, come over this evening, will you?”
“All right.” The last sound of Jasper's feet on the stairs reached Pickering, when he suddenly left his chair and flew into the hall.
“Jap—oh, I say, Jap!” Then he plunged back into his room to thrust his head out of the window. “Jap!” he howled, to the consternation of a fat old gentleman passing beneath, who on account of his size, finding it somewhat inconvenient to look up, therefore waddled into the street, and surveyed the house gravely.
Pickering slammed down the window, leaving the old gentleman to stare as long as he saw fit.
“I can't go over there to-night, looking like this.” He pranced up to the mirror again, fuming every step of the way, and surveyed himself in dismay. There was some improvement in the appearance of his countenance, to be sure, but not by any means enough to please him. His pale blue eyes were so small, and their surroundings so swollen, that they reminded him of nothing so much as those of a small pig he had made acquaintance with in a visit up in the country. While his nose, long and usually quite aristocratic-looking, had resigned all claims to distinction, and was hopelessly pudgy.
“Jasper knows I can't go in this shape,” he cried in a fury. “Great Cæsar's ghost! I never supposed it banged a fellow up so, to cry just once!” And the next moments were spent in sopping his face violently with the wet towel, which did no good, as it had been plentifully supplied with that treatment before.
At last he flung himself into his chair. “If I don't go over, Jap will think I haven't my lessons, so that's all right. And I won't have them anyway if I don't tackle them pretty quick. So here goes!” And presently the only sound to be heard was the ticking of the little clock, varied by the turning of his pages, or the rattling of the paper on which he was working out the problems for to-morrow.
“Oh dear me! Jasper,” Polly exclaimed about half-past seven, “I don't believe Pickering is coming.”
“He hasn't his lessons, I suppose,” said Jasper. “You know I told him to come over as soon as they were done. Well, Polly, we agreed, you know, to let him alone as to invitations until the lessons were out of the way, so I won't go over after him.”