David felt annoyed at this. ‘Are all trout as rude as you?’ he asked. The trout opened its mouth two or three times, and each time David thought it was going to speak. [Illustration: David and the trout] ‘Yes,’ it said at length. ‘All.’ ‘I should think you must get rather tired of each other’s company then,’ said David. Again it seemed as if the trout was going to speak, and this time David counted that it opened and shut its mouth eleven times before it answered. ‘We are,’ it said. ‘We’re each of us tired of everybody else. But I’m most tired of you. I hate being interrupted when I’m busy, and I hate people running into my face. I never have liked it, and I don’t mean to begin now.’ ‘Well, I’ve apologised for that,’ said David. ‘I can’t do more.’ This time the trout opened and shut its mouth only nine times before it answered. ‘Yes, you can,’ it said. ‘You can go away. I can’t think why you don’t.’ David was naturally a polite boy, but when any one was rude to him he could easily be rude back. He forgot all about his swimming fish-fashion. ‘I don’t believe you’re a bit busy,’ he said. ‘You haven’t done a thing since I was here before. You’ve just waved and stared.’ The trout looked at David with one eye, then moved his head and looked at him with the other. ‘That’s two things then,’ it said. ‘Yes, but that doesn’t make you busy,’ said David. ‘You couldn’t possibly be idler. That doesn’t count.’ A faint gleam of intelligence came into that foolish face. ‘I can count,’ said the trout. ‘One—two—four—three—nine and a half—a hundred. There!’ ‘You’re quite wrong,’ said David. ‘It goes one—two—six—four. Let me see what does come after four?’ he added, suddenly forgetting how to count himself. ‘Nothing: that’s the end,’ said the trout. ‘You needn’t wait any longer. We’ve both finished. You may get down. Never mind about wiping your mouth or anything.’ ‘One—two—six—fourteen,’ began David again, determined to get it right, when suddenly he was blown all sideways, as it were, by a tremendous draught of water, and the trout’s tail whisked by his face. As for the trout itself, that one swish of its tail had carried it ten yards away, and it was drifting back again with an enormous worm hanging out of its mouth. Its cheeks bulged with it, and its eyes stared so that David thought they would drop out. But in two or three gulps it managed to swallow the rest of the worm, and to David’s great surprise it looked almost pleasant and winked at him. ‘There!’ it said. ‘Now you know why I was so busy. I shall have a holiday for three minutes until I’m hungry again. Who are you, and what are you doing here, without being drowned? It’s all very irregular.’ ‘I was a Field-Marshal last,’ began David, rather proudly. ‘What a stupid thing to be!’ said the trout, ‘especially as there aren’t any fields here. And who asked you to come to my lake?’ ‘Nobody. I chose to come,’ said David.