Page:Daskam Bacon--Whom the gods destroy.djvu/174

 The boy raised his eyes again.

"Mr, Littlejohn lets me—I always do," he repeated.

The new librarian pressed her lips together with an air of highly creditable restraint.

"Mr. Littlejohn allowed a great many irregularities which have been stopped," she announced, "and as there is no reason why you should do what the other children cannot, you will have to go. So hurry up, for I'm very busy this morning."

She did not speak unkindly, but there was an unmistakable decision in her tone, and the boy got up awkwardly, tucked his crutch under his arm, and laying the big book down with care, went out in silence, his heavy boot echoing unevenly on the hardwood floor. The librarian went on to Section K.

Presently the young assistant, who had been accustomed to keep her crocheted lace-work on the Philosophical shelf, directly behind the Critique of Pure Reason, recollected that it would in all human probability be discovered, on the removal of that epoch-making treatise, and came hastily down