Pelle explained his requirements.
“Shirts! shirts!” Alfred chortled with delight, and clapped his hands before his face. “Good Lord, he wants to gets shirts on tick! If only they had been linen shirts!” He was near bursting with laughter.
Pelle tried again. As a peasant—for he was still that—he had thought of shirts first of all; but now he wanted a summer overcoat and rubber cuffs. “Why do you want credit?” asked the shopkeeper, hesitating. “Are you expecting any money? Or is there any one who will give you a reference?”
No, Pelle didn’t want to bring any one else into it; it was simply that he had no money.
“Then wait until you have,” said the shopkeeper surlily. “We don’t clothe paupers!” Pelle slunk away abashed.
“You’re a fool!” said Alfred shortly. “You are just like Albinus—he can never learn how to do it!”
“How do you do it then?” asked Pelle meekly.
“How do I do it—how do I do it?” Alfred could give no explanation; “it just came of itself. But naturally I don’t tell them that I’m poor! No, you’d better leave it alone—it’ll never succeed with you!”
“Why do you sit there and pinch your upper lip?” asked Pelle discontentedly.
“Pinch? You goat, I’m stroking my moustache!”