FullReads

“I?” said Teacher; “I?”

“Yiss ma’an, that’s how he says. On’y I know you don’t lies. I know we should be monitors like you says.”

“When, dearie?”

“On your weddinge. You know you says me, und Patrick, und Nathan, should be monitors on your weddinge when you marries mit him.” And Morris stretched a pointing finger at the foe. After one radiant glance at Teacher’s face, Doctor Ingraham possessed himself of the scrubby hand and shook it warmly.

“And so you shall, old chap,” he cried, “so you shall. You may be best man if you so desire. Anything you like.”

“New clothes?” asked Morris.

“From stem to stern.”

“Ice-cream?”

“Gallons.”

“Paper napkins mit birds?”

“Bushels.”

“Can I mine little sister bring?”

“A dozen little sisters if you have them.”

“Can I go in a carriage, down and up? It’s stylish.”

“You shall have a parade of carriages–one for each sister.”

“Morris,” commanded Miss Bailey, “go home.”

When she turned to confront Doctor Ingraham the “light face” was brightly pink and the “terrible Sheeny eyes” held a mixture of embarrassment and anger.

“Of course I can’t explain this,” she said. “I must simply ask you to believe that he is making a dreadful mistake. You were quite right when you said they were ungrateful little brutes. They are. You were quite right, too, about teas being a bore. They are. So you will pardon me if I go to see little Leah Yonowsky. The twins are reported ill again. Good afternoon.”

It was a very rueful and disgusted enemy that the cabinet discerned in the offing.

“Good Lord!” cried the Commander-in-Chief. “Here he comes again, and Miss Bailey ain’t with him.”

“Morris,” said the enemy, “you’ve done for me, my boy.”

“Won’t she go by your side on the party?” asked the Prime Minister.

“She will not,” admitted the hostile power. “So you may as well trot out Miss Blake and begin to collect my eleven cents. For, though you may not have discovered it–and there be those who doubt it–a ten-cent cigar’s a smoke.”