"Oh, yes, of course," he said at last; "I remember now. Madge Elliston."
If, say, ten seconds sufficed for enjoyment of the recollection of the "Beggar's Opera," how long should you say would be necessary for the absorption of the truth contained in those two words? A lifetime? An honest answer; we won't undertake to say it's not the right one. Harry, at least, seemed to be of that opinion.
"After all, though, it would be rather absurd to spend a whole lifetime in bed," he observed, after devoting twenty minutes to the subject. Then he jumped out of bed and pulled up the shade.
Vague flittings of poetry and song buzzed through his brain. One little phrase in particular kept humming behind his ears; a scrap from a song he had heard Madge herself sing often enough:—"What shall I do to show how much I love her?" The thing rather annoyed him by its insistence. He stood by the open window and inhaled a few deep breaths of the quickening March air. "What shall I do to show how much I love her!" sang the air as it rushed up his nose and became breath and out again and became carbon dioxide. "I really don't know, I'm sure," he answered, impatiently breaking off and starting on some exercises he performed on mornings when he felt particularly energetic and there was time. Their rhythm was fascinating; he found he could do them in two different ways:—What shall—I do—to show—how much—I love her, or, What shall I—do to show—how much I—? "Oh, hang it!" He suddenly lost all interest in them. With one impatient, dramatic movement he tore off the upper half of his pajamas, ripping off three buttons as he did so. With another slightly more complicated but even more dramatic, he extricated himself from the lower half, breaking the string in the process.
"Ts! ts! More work for somebody!" he said, making the sound in the roof of his mouth indicative of reproof. He kicked the damaged garments lightly onto the bed and sauntered into the adjoining bathroom.
He turned on the water in the bathtub and stood watching it a moment as it gushed out in its noisy enthusiasm. "WhatshallIdotoshowhowmuchIloveher?" it inquired uncouthly. "Oh, do stop bothering me," said Harry, turning disgustedly away; "I've got to shave."
He lathered his face and took the razor in his right hand, while with his left he delicately lifted the end of his nose, so as to make a taut surface of his upper lip. It was a trick he had much admired in barbers. "Somehow it's not so effective when you do it to yourself," he said regretfully, watching the effect in the mirror. It helped his shaving, however, and shaving helped his thinking. He was able to think quite clearly and seriously, in fact, in spite of the roaring of the water nearby.
"I suppose I might keep away from her for a while," he said presently.
That really seemed a good idea; the more he thought of it the better he liked it. "I'll go down and stay with Trotty," he said as he scraped the last strip of lather off his face, remembering how fervently Trotty, recovering from a severe illness on the Trotwood estate in North Carolina, had begged him to come down and cheer his solitude. "And I won't come back until I know," he continued. "One must be sure. Absolutely."
He plunged into his bath and the stimulus of the cold water set his brain working faster. "I'll start this very morning. Let's see; I've missed the ten-thirty, but I can catch the twelve-three, if I look alive, and get the three-fifty from New York.... No, on second thoughts, I'd better have lunch and pack comfortably and start this afternoon. That'll be better; it never does to be in too much of a hurry!"