"Suppose I get the sack?"
"I could almost wish it, twin."
He laughed.
"Never did man be burdened with such a degenerate twin! Well, old
Tellbridge wants to speak to me this afternoon! In the manager's room,
Nell!"
"A rise!" she ejaculated.
"Or a fall! I was showing the chaps how to play handball. We'd cleared
the room a bit. Tellbridge came in. Lord, he did swell! I thought it
was a good thing we'd cleared the room. He asked a few questions--with
bland edges to them--and he wants to see me at half-past two in his
room."
"Oh, Denis, suppose--"
"A wrinkled brow to-day, Nell!" he laughed. "I refuse to suppose," he
observed gaily. "Even in my very innermost recesses, I don't suppose.
I'm horribly hungry. Let's see, there's no mutton from yesterday to be
eaten up, is there?"
She flung her arms wide.
"My innermost recesses are not supposing now!"
When he came back that afternoon he brought Ted Lancaster, and both were
laden with parcels.
"Celebration parcels, Nell!"
Ted said, "I say," and wrung her hand hard.
"Denis! Well?"
"What? Oh, my interview with old Pom-Pom. My dear, I made a plain
statement of the facts of the case, and he actually smiled! Here endeth
the--er--_third_ interview!"
Molly came in and poked about amongst the parcels.
"I do wish Aunt Kezia were going out to-night."
Denis pretended to feel faint.
"_You_, Molly? You, the patent softener of a relative's hard heart?"
Molly blushed and glanced abashed at Ted's amused face.
"Well, for her own sake, anyway," she protested, and dropped her eyes
with a giggle over her hypocrisy.
"Ted," Nell said, "here's a penny."
"Thanks awfully."
He took it and dropped it into his pocket.
"It may come in useful some day. One never knows."
"Well?" she said.
"Well what?"
"You don't think I'd give you a penny for nothing! It's for your
thoughts."
He gave her a quick little glance.
"Oh, my thoughts! And I hoped it was pure disinterested benevolence!"
"Tell me your thoughts! I'm sure you were thinking of something nice
for us--"
He interrupted flurriedly.
"Something nice? I--I-- What made you think that? I wasn't! I
really--"
"You looked sort of kind," she said, laughing.
"Well, I wasn't!"
"Give me back my penny!" He handed it back with an absent-minded air.
Protests were sent and brought up to the Stronghold that evening. An
abashed and blushing Sarah brought them, and an austere and angry Miss
Kezia sent them.
Sheila Pat marched downstairs, and knocked at Herr Schmidt's door.
"Kom in!"
Sheila Pat went in. Her eyes were very bright, her pig-tail was very
crooked.
"Herr Schmidt," she said, "please will you walk out with Aunt Kezia?"
Herr Schmidt's big face grew redder than its usual red wont. It chanced
that he understood the meaning of "walking out."
"Ach!" he ejaculated.
Sheila Pat eyed him severely.
"Sarah says if you're walking out with a young man you must always go
when he asks you to," she explained. Her voice rose, "Oh, Herr Schmidt,
you could _always_ ask Aunt Kezia when we want to get rid of her, and,"
impishly she glowed, "she could never say no!"
"I'm sorry--" he began.
She urged strenuously. "She's very worthy! She gives all her old
clothes to charity. And Sarah says she's very just, and she'd make your
wages go a very long way. Sarah says that's a great thing."
He began to chuckle, but checked it in his distress at having to
disappoint her. She came down at last to a humble, "Well, will you
please just take her for a walk _now_?"
She returned, chastened and severe, to the Stronghold. A visit a few
minutes later, from Miss Kezia herself, lent an added intensity to the
small figure that flung itself desperately at Mr. Mark Yovil, who called
to leave some book for Denis.
"Take her away! Walk out with her! She's a wet counterpane on us!"
Mark Yovil, known for his obstinacy, his firm will, was weak where this
Atom was concerned.
"I'm going to a lecture," he declared hesitatingly.
"Take her!"
"But, my dear, it's nothing that would interest her. She would not
come--"
"Oh, _please_! 'Magine us--up there--all quiet and still like dead
mice! And our letter-day! It--it's really very sad!"
He looked down into her upturned face, into the wild entreaty of her
great eyes.
Miss Kezia came into the hall and greeted him, surprised.
He turned to her, and asked her if she would be so very kind--his sister
had lost her cook quite suddenly--not very experienced--advice--
Miss Kezia presently had gone upstairs to don her bonnet, her one
weakness, love of giving advice, enveloping her in a cloud of
complacency.
"Now, small Sheila Pat, am I not a true friend? But, mark this, I have
told no falsehoods." He took her on his knee. "My sister has lost her
cook. She is inexperienced. She does want advice," he twinkled there;
"I don't know that it's the advice of your estimable aunt that she
particularly requires, but we'll hope so. Your aunt once whacked my
sister's baby on the back when it had swallowed a spoon or fork or knife
or something of the kind. Perhaps it was the soup-tureen. Well, now, I
shall have to leave your aunt in one room while I explain to my sister.
You'll have to love me for ever for this, Sheila Pat."
A little later, and noise echoed with joyful abandon through the house.