The Youth of Parnassus, and Other StoriesSmith, Logan Pearsall
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The Youth of Parnassus, and Other Stories
Smith, Logan Pearsall
Short stories; University of Oxford -- Fiction
Entering, Craik saw a number of hats and sticks in the hall. Miss Lamb,
he thought, must have several brothers. He put down his stick, and the
book with it, after a moment's hesitation; that was better, he would
leave it there and would come and fetch it when the conversation turned
that way. Then, buttoning up his black coat over the lecture notes that
filled his pocket, he followed the servant through the house out into
the little garden. It was full of strong sunlight, and there were
several undergraduates there. One was up in a tree; Cobbe lay in a
hammock smoking, and another of Craik's pupils lay on the grass at Miss
Lamb's feet, rolling lemons. He stopped for a moment.
"Oh Mr. Corn--Mr. Craik, I mean," Miss Lamb called out in a friendly
voice, "I am so glad to see you."
Craik advanced with an awkward smile, and Miss Lamb reached out her
right hand most cordially. In her left hand she held a lemon-squeezer.
"How good of you to come! And isn't it hot? Exactly like America, I've
been saying. We've just come out into the garden without our hats. Won't
you sit down on that rug, if you don't mind? Oh, I nearly forgot; let me
introduce you to my aunt, Mrs. Stacey. I guess you know everybody else."
Craik shook hands with a lady who was sitting and knitting in an arbour,
nodded to the undergraduates, and then settled down on a rug in the
sunshine. How he wished that he had not decided at the last moment to
wear a tall hat and a long coat! The undergraduates were all in
flannels.
Miss Lamb spoke of the garden party.
"Your lovely college! It is _too_ ideal; it is like a dream. And the
cloisters too! You don't know how solemn it made me feel. Now, you
needn't laugh, Mr. Cobbe, I really did feel solemn--more solemn, I
guess, than you have ever been. Gracious, it _is_ hot!" she added, with
a sudden change of subject. "Mr. Craik, let me give you some of this
lemon squash; I made it myself."
"Thanks! I shall be most pleased to have some." Craik's voice seemed to
himself to be formal, and his phrase pedantic.
"Oh, but what was I saying?" Miss Lamb went on, looking at the company
generally.
"You were telling us how solemn you were," Cobbe suggested. "Wasn't it
rather a new experience?"
"Now, Mr. Cobbe, what a horrid thing to say," she replied, with great
good-nature. "You're his tutor, Mr. Craik, aren't you? Well, next time
you have a chance, I hope you'll set him some real horrid work to do.
I'm sure he needs it."
Miss Lamb said this casually, with a pleasant laugh, as she fanned
herself. No one answered; Craik, and even Cobbe coloured, and the
undergraduate in the tree suppressed a titter.
But Mrs. Stacey at this moment asked by happy chance some question of
Craik, addressing him as "Professor Craik," in her high American voice,
and he hastened to answer her with effusion.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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