He passed around to his regular place, disposed his books and papers,
and placed his _Silence_ sign in a fairly conspicuous position. This
followed his usual custom. Yet his manner of making his arrangements
to-night wanted something of his ordinary aggressive confidence. In
fact, his promise to give an hour a day to exercise lay on his heart
like lead, and the lumps on his eye, large though they were, did not in
the least represent the dimensions of the fall he had received at the
hands of Mr. Pat.
Fifi was looking a little more fragile than when we saw her last, a
little more thin-cheeked, a shade more ethereal-eyed. Her cough was
quite bad to-night, and this increased her nervousness. How could she
_help_ from disturbing him with that dry tickling going on right along
in her throat? It had been a trying day, when everything seemed to go
wrong from the beginning. She had waked up feeling very listless and
tired; had been late for school; had been kept in for Cicero. In the
afternoon she had been going to a tea given to her class at the school,
but her mother said her cold was too bad for her to go, and besides she
really felt too tired.
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