"Thank you very much," John responded solemnly. "Yes, thank you, Harrington, I believe I would."
He bent over and picked it up, and followed his host inside.
Neither of them said anything as they went upstairs.
"Here's your room," Allan offered, showing it politely.
"So it is," murmured John in a quite expressionless voice, looking at it without seeming to know how to enter.
"It's to live in, you know," Allan suggested.
At this broad hint John went in and put his suitcase on the bed. He still appeared to be in more or less of a trance-state.
"If we'd known, we'd have tied a little white ribbon here and there, and arranged a rice-cascade—a shower, isn't it? or something," continued his host, amiably. "Awfully sorry, old chap, but you shouldn't have been so darn secretive. But we'll do our best—"
John awoke at this, and caught up a small pink pincushion which sat in the mathematical middle of his dresser, and threw it. It didn't hit Allan, because he dodged.
"That's one of Phyllis' favorite pincushions," he warned John from outside the door. "I say, Johnny, this isn't any way to repay hospitality."