第25章

``Yes,'' he cried, ``but a lady that didn't live here wouldn't.Ye gods! What do you suppose she WOULD think? You know what he's got on!''

``It's a sort of sleeveless jersey he wears, Willie, I think.''

``No, you DON'T think that!'' he cried, with great bitterness.``You know it's not a jersey!

You know perfectly well what it is, and yet you expect to keep him out there when--when one of the one of the nobl--when my friends arrive!

And they'll think that's our DOG out there, won't they? When intelligent people come to a house and see a dog sitting out in front, they think it's the family in the house's dog, don't they?''

William's condition becoming more and more disordered, he paced the room, while his agony rose to a climax.``Ye gods! What do you think Miss Pratt will think of the people of this town, when she's invited to meet a few of my friends and the first thing she sees is a nigger in his undershirt?

What 'll she think when she finds that child's eaten up half the food, and the people have to explain that the dog in the front yard belongs to the darky--'' He interrupted himself with a groan: ``And prob'ly she wouldn't believe it.

Anybody'd SAY they didn't own a dog like that!

And that's what you want her to see, before she even gets inside the house! Instead of a regular gardener in livery like we ought to have, and a bulldog or a good Airedale or a fox-hound, or something, the first things you want intelligent people from out of town to see are that awful old darky and his mongrel scratchin' fleas and like as not lettin' 'em get on other people! THAT'd be nice, wouldn't it? Go out to tea expecting decent treatment and get fl--''

``WILLIE!''

Mrs.Baxter managed to obtain his attention.

``If you'll go and brush your hair I'll send Genesis and Clematis away for the rest of the afternoon.And then if you 'll sit down quietly and try to keep cool until your friends get here, I'll--''

`` `Quietly'!'' he echoed, shaking his head over this mystery.``I'm the only one that IS quiet around here.Things 'd be in a fine condition to receive guests if I didn't keep pretty cool, I guess!''

``There, there,'' she said, soothingly.``Go and brush your hair.And change your collar, Willie;

it's all wilted.I'll send Genesis away.''

His wandering eye failed to meet hers with any intelligence.``Collar,'' he muttered, as if in soliloquy.``Collar.''

``Change it!'' said Mrs.Baxter, raising her voice.``It's WILTED.''

He departed in a dazed manner.

Passing through the hall, he paused abruptly, his eye having fallen with sudden disapproval upon a large, heavily framed, glass-covered engraving, ``The Battle of Gettysburg,'' which hung upon the wall, near the front door.Undeniably, it was a picture feeble in decorative quality; no doubt, too, William was right in thinking it as unworthy of Miss Pratt, as were Jane and Genesis and Clematis.He felt that she must never see it, especially as the frame had been chipped and had a corner broken, but it was more pleasantly effective where he found it than where (in his nervousness) he left it.A few hasty jerks snapped the elderly green cords by which it was suspended; then he laid the picture upon the floor and with his handkerchief made a curious labyrinth of avenues in the large oblong area of fine dust which this removal disclosed upon the wall.Pausing to wipe his hot brow with the same implement, he remembered that some one had made allusions to his collar and hair, whereupon he sprang to the stairs, mounted two at a time, rushed into his own room, and confronted his streaked image in the mirror.