"Governesses before?"
Hippo, who had been recovering from his first feeling of awe, roared loudly at this.
Skippy looked indignantly at this breach of etiquette and reached thoughtfully for a tennis racket.
"Please, sir," said Hippo hastily, "High school."
Skippy considered him thoughtfully and something told him that in the right-hand lower vest pocket there was undoubtedly a certain amount of round hard silver bodies and moreover that this condition was not simply episodic but chronic.
"That coot may be fresh but he is going to do a lot of heavy spending," he said to himself with conviction.
How he knew is immaterial. There is an instinct that guides—some have it, some haven't it. You can't explain it. Doc Macnooder for instance could diagnose a pocket-book as keenly as a surgeon. It's a gift, that's all. Skippy possessed this gift.
"Mother just brought you in?"
Hippo acknowledged this with a look of the greatest distress.