Page:Across the Stream.djvu/22

12 was getting on for six years old, into thoughts capable of being solidified into language. He could not have solidified them himself, but if any one capable of presenting them to him in actual words had asked him, "Is it this you mean?" he would have assented. And his solidified thoughts would have taken the following mould:

There was something odd about females, and it was a mystery into which he did not at all want to enquire. They wore skirts, which perhaps concealed some abnormality, which would be fearful to contemplate. They had soft faces and soft bodies; when his mother took him on her knee—she already said that he was getting too big a boy to sit on her knee, which to Archie sounded very grand and delightful—she was soft to his shoulder, and her cheek was soft to his. But when he sat on his father's knee he felt a hard, firm substance behind him, and the contrast was similar to the contrast between his mother's soft cushions and his father's leather-clad chairs. And his father had a hard, bristly cheek on which to receive Archie's good-night kiss. Judged by the standards of pleasure and luxury, it was not nearly as nice as his mother's, but it gave him, however great need there was for caution, a sense of identity with himself. He was of that species.… And this conception of abnormality in women was strongly confirmed when, one morning, he went as usual to his mother's bedroom to see her before she went down to breakfast. She had been late in getting up that day, and, not finding her in her bedroom, Archie's attention had been arrested by hearing sounds from her bathroom next door, and very naturally had turned the handle in order to enter. But a voice from inside had said:

"Is that you, darling? Wait just a minute."

"But I want to come in now," said Archie. "I'm coming in."

"Archie, I shall be very angry if you come in before