“I’m afraid Mrs. Crow wouldn’t stand for that,” laughed Malcolm. “And then, too, you say this is cold.”
“Cold! What of it? Who would care whether he was cold or warm when he could lie in the midst of such luxury?” Rob stretched himself on the leather couch and crushed innumerable pillows under his head. “We will now have soft music and light refreshments, Mal.”
“I’ve got some crackers,” said Malcolm eagerly.
“Fetch them along. What do you think of all this, Evan? Isn’t our little friend a—a one of those things commencing with an S?”
“Cinch?” asked Evan gravely.
Rob viewed him doubtfully.
“Cinch! That doesn’t begin— Oh, you run away and play! Syb—sybarite! That’s the word. What is a sybarite, Mal?”
“Oh, a man fond of good things, I reckon. Actually the Sybarites were inhabitants of Sybaris, in southern Italy. Don’t you remember that Seneca tells of a Sybarite who complained that he hadn’t slept well, and when they asked him why he told them that he had found a rose petal doubled under him and that it had hurt him?”
“Isn’t he a wonder?” demanded Rob admiringly of Evan. “Do you wonder that he’s a whole class ahead of us stupids? Frankly, though, Mal, I don’t recall that story of Mr. Seneca’s, but he said a whole lot of things I’ve forgotten—or never heard of. Anyway, that’s what you are, Mal, a sybarite, a blooming sybarite.”