Page:Chesterton - The Club of Queer Trades.djvu/224

The Club of Queer Trades of a man working out a problem, the other leaping and playing like a child.

After about three-quarters of an hour of this imbecile scene, Grant put the pencil in his pocket, but kept the note-book open in his hand, and, walking round the mad professor, planted himself directly in front of him.

Then occurred something that even those already used to that wild morning had not anticipated or dreamed. The professor, on finding Basil in front of him, stared with a blank benignity for a few seconds, and then drew up his left leg and hung it bent in the attitude that his sister had described as being the first of all his antics. And the moment he had done it Basil Grant lifted his own leg and held it out rigid before him, confronting Chadd with the flat sole of his boot. The professor dropped his bent leg, and, swinging his weight on to it, kicked out the other behind, like a man swimming. Basil crossed his feet like a saltier cross, and then flung them apart again, giving a leap into the air. Then, before any of the spectators could say a word or even entertain a 204