Then quite suddenly a blue cloud hit a black one, and Gypsy leapt out
of his door as far as he could go, and the hail came down like peas and
rattled in a box by the theatre-men. So Gypsy called “Hi! hi!” very
loudly, and Mr. Morley, who had just got under the portico, came out
and crossed the road again.
“Yes?” said Mr. Morley.
“I _know_ you’d better turn it on,” said Gypsy.
“Thank you very much,” said Mr. Morley, and gave Gypsy five shillings.
“Can I have it in pennies?” shouted Gypsy. (He had to shout because of
the thunder.)
“Certainly,” shouted Mr. Morley, turning up his coat-collar a little
too late, because ribbons of rain were already running down his neck
from the guttering round his top hat. It took him a long time to count
sixty pennies into Gypsy’s hands, which got very full; then Mr. Morley
wasn’t certain he’d given him enough, and thought they’d better count
them again to make sure. So they did, holding the pennies in their
mouths or under their armpits, or between their knees, as they got
them counted; and then Gypsy lifted his arm by mistake, to wipe the
rain out of his eyes, and dropped a shillingsworth. They rolled and
splashed about Trafalgar Square, which could now be paddled in. Gypsy
wasn’t allowed to leave his post, so Mr. Morley knelt down on his
beautifully-pressed trousers, and crawled about the Square, finding the
shilling one by one. It took him some time, because he could hardly
see for the water tumbling off his beautifully-ironed silk hat, and for
the lightning making him start and say “Oh!” just as he was about to
pick a penny up. But at last he brought them all back to Gypsy.
“So sorry to have troubled you,” said Gypsy.
“Not at all,” said Mr. Morley, because the Morley Hotel manners are
faultless. Then he went back to the Hotel, and changed his boots, and
turned on the light in the Reading-Room. And then the sun came out.
So he had to cross the Square again, and he found Ginger outside the
Weatherhouse looking as nice as mixed ice-cream in a lovely summer
smock.
“What delightful weather,” said Ginger. “Why have you got the Hotel
lights on?”
“Would you turn them out if you were I?” asked Mr. Morley, for his
grammar was as faultless as his manners.
“I would indeed,” said Ginger sunnily; “seldom have I seen so blue a
sky.”
Mr. Morley tipped her handsomely (the information apart, her smile was
worth it), lifted his hat to her, and fled.
“How fast he’s going,” said Gypsy, from the very back of the
Weatherhouse. “What did he give you, darling?”
“A half-sovereign!” gasped Ginger. “A real old-fashioned
half-sovereign!”
“No wonder he’s running,” said Gypsy. “But we must get it changed
somehow.”
“Oh, must we?” pleaded Ginger.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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