Page:The Specimen Case.djvu/226

Rh "Why, yes," he continued cheerfully; "there is no particular hurry in his case, so I thought that I'd ask you to take him over for a few weeks. Measles, you know."

"What!" I exclaimed. "He has measles? Really, Henry"

"Not at all," he interrupted with a smile; "only Florrie has. Consequently Bobbie can't go to school, and we thought that he'd be all the better out of the way."

"Out of your way?" I suggested, with perhaps just a shade of emphasis.

"Yes," he agreed simply; "Mary's in particular. She has enough to see to just now, dear woman."

"Oh," was all I said, but a moment later, feeling that something more was required, I added, "So this is Bobbie. It must be ten years since I saw him last. Now is he the Musical Prodigy or the Artistic Genius?" Of course I really knew that Bobbie was neither, but the remark came to my lips. All Henry's children are wonderful, and the surprising fact is that they seem able to convince other people of it besides their parents. I have given up the Trafalgar Magazine because of the frequency with which Vernon's drawings appeared in its pages, and any day if I am foolish enough to look down the outside sheet of the Telegraph I can be annoyed by seeing that Gertrude is singing "At Camberwell," or "In the City"—wherever that may exactly be. Bobbie was sure to be Something.

"No," replied Henry, "neither of those. He is the Scientific Phenomenon and engages in obscure mysteries in the back-kitchen. Chemistry, isn't it, Bobbie?"

"Yes, father," replied the boy, but at the mere word "chemistry" I saw him flush suddenly and pull nervously at his collar, before he edged away behind a palm. The