Page:The history of Mr. Polly.djvu/202

 and get quite an hour of it, and sometimes Mr. Rusper would come into the outfitter’s shop with “Heard the (kik) latest?” and spend the rest of the morning.

Then Mr. Rusper married, and he married very inconsiderately a woman who was totally uninteresting to Mr. Polly. A coolness grew between them from the first intimation of her advent. Mr. Polly couldn’t help thinking when he saw her that she drew her hair back from her forehead a great deal too tightly, and that her elbows were angular. His desire not to mention these things in the apt terms that welled up so richly in his mind, made him awkward in her presence, and that gave her an impression that he was hiding some guilty secret from her. She decided he must have a bad influence upon her husband, and she made it a point to appear whenever she heard him talking to Rusper.

One day they became a little heated about the German peril.

“I lay (kik) they’ll invade us,” said Rusper.

“Not a bit of it. William’s not the Zerxiacious sort.”

“You’ll see, O’ Man.”

“Just what I shan’t do.”

“Before (kik) five years are out.”

“Not it.”

“Yes.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“Oh! Boil it hard!” said Mr. Polly.

Then he looked up and saw Mrs. Rusper standing