LET'S get along,” Anthony said in a a thick, strange voice. He stumbled
forward; his eyes were hot, blurred; he tried in vain to wink clear his
vision. Suddenly his elbow struck sharply against a shelf, and there was
an answering crash, the splintering of glass smashing upon the floor.
Doctor Allhop hurried in to the scene of the disaster. “You young bull
among the bottles!” he exclaimed in exasperated tones; “a whole gross of
perfume, all the white lilac, lost.”
Anthony Ball stood motionless, embarrassed and annoyed by the accident;
and great, heavy coils of the scent rose about him; they filled his
nostrils with wave on wave of pungent odor, and stung his eyes so that
he shut them. The scent seemed to press about him, to obstruct his
breathing, weigh upon his heart; he put out a hand as if to ward it
off. It seemed to him that great masses of the flower surrounded him,
shutting him with a white, sweet wall from the world. He swayed dizzily;
then vanquished the illusion with an expression of regret for the damage
he had wrought.
The Doctor was on his knees, brushing together the debris; William
Williams guffawed; and Craik smiled idly. Meredith swore, tapping a
cigarette on his silver case. “You're a parlor ornament, you are,” he
told Anthony.
A feeling of impotence enveloped the latter, a sullen resentment against
an occurrence the inevitable result of which must descend like a shower
of cold water upon his freshly-stirred desires. “I am sorry as hell,
Doctor,” he repeated; “what did that box cost you?”
“Six seventy,” Allhop shot impatiently over his shoulder.
Anthony produced his three dollars, and, smoothing them, laid the sum on
a table. “I will stop in with the rest to-morrow morning,” he said. The
Doctor rose and turned, partly mollified; but, to avoid the argument
which, he felt, might follow, Anthony strode quickly out into the
drugstore. There at the white marble sodawater fountain a bevy of youth
was consuming colorific cones of ice cream, drinking syrupy concoctions
from tall, glistening glasses. They called him by name, but he passed
them without a sign of recognition, still the victim of his jangling
sensibilities.