Page:Daskam--The imp and the angel.djvu/74

The Imp and the Author but still the Imp sat drumming on the pail and communing bitterly with his thoughts.

Let them go in to lunch! Let them sit and chatter meaninglessly around the snowy tables! Let them plan their moonlight sails with refreshments in baskets and Miss Eleanor's guitar! At least there would be one person whose ear would not be pinched that day; one suffering soul that none should find opportunity to call a ridiculous baby and a funny little Imp; one determined recluse whose opinion of some others would, were it known, blight with its withering scorn all their self-satisfied conceit!

When every sound, including the futile shouting of his own name, at which he grimly smiled, had ceased, and the last lingering child had been haled in from its blissful paddling to lunch, the last lounger summoned from his umbrella, he arose and walked gloomily by the much-sounding sea. Had one thing in all this weary morning gone right? Had there been one cheerful happening, one single ray of pleasure? Not one. From the idiot who had derided his precious bicycle trousers, calling that fascinating triangular seat a patch, refusing to be convinced of its style 52