Page:Daskam--The imp and the angel.djvu/172

The Imp Disposes him for it, doesn't it, now? Have you ever noticed that injustice is their most pronounced quality—always excepting their absurd attractiveness? 'Oh, yes, indeed,' they say, 'I love you, and you only, and since you know that, I feel perfectly free to reduce as many of your companions as possible to your state. If you object, you are ridiculously jealous.' Has that occurred to you, my young friend?"

"I am jealous," the Imp announced. "I am as jealous as can be. My mother says she should think I'd be yellow all over me, I'm so jealous. She says a little is all very well, but too much is childish. It tires anybody to death. They get cross."

"They do indeed," the man returned fervently. "They get almighty cross. That shows their conscience is not clear."

"It shows you don't deserve anybody to be nice to you," contradicted the Imp promptly. "So I don't go till I'm asked—I wait. But Mr. Florian never waits," he scowled. "Mrs. Bishop says she pities my wife," he concluded proudly.

The man burst out laughing. 144