Page:E Nesbit - Man and Maid (1906).djvu/75

 he’d look quite too frightfully sweet for anything.”

“He’s exactly like that Polish model we had last week. Oh, Molly, he’s coming back again.”

Again he passed the two girls. His expression was certainly not amiable.

“How long have you known him?” Molly asked.

“I don’t know him. I tell you I only see him on the platform at Mill Vale. He and I seem to be the only people—the only decent people—who’ve found out the new station. He goes up by the 9.1 every day, and so do I. And the train’s always late, so we have the platform and the booking office to ourselves. And there we sit, or stand, or walk, morning after morning like two stuck pigs in a trough of silence.”

“Don’t jumble your metaphors, though you very nearly carried it off with the trough, I own. Stuck pigs don’t walk—in troughs, or anywhere else.”

“Well, you know what I mean”

“But what do you want the wretched man to do? He can’t speak to you: it wouldn’t be proper”

“Proper—why not? We’re human beings,