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"For trying to put one over on me, an old pal... stood by him through thick and thin... would've gone through fire for Whit Monk, and in my way I have, many's the time. And now he hooks up with Phinuit and this Delorme woman, and leaves me to shuffle my feet on the doormat... and thinks I'll let him get away with it." The voice in the dark gave a grunt of infinite contempt: "Like hell..."
It was his own dog a little, worthless cur, that had a hide like a doormat and a heart as big as the United States a waif, a stray, that had attached himself to the contractor at the shanties of the construction gang, and slept by his bed, and followed at his heel, and lived on the glance of his eye. He was off again, the dog fairly winging his way to match his master's speed.
Then the doors of the houses opened slowly; the green outside shutters were flung wide; and an army of coloured servants bearing brooms, appeared on the porches, and made expressive gestures to one another over the railings. Occasionally, when one lifted a doormat in order to beat the dust out of it, she would forget to put it down again while she stared after the milk cart.
The doors stood wide open, and the interior seemed as well lighted as the cavern itself, although none of them could discover from whence the light came. At each side of the entrance lay a fish such as they had never seen before. It was flat as a doormat and seemed to cling fast to the coral floor. Upon its back were quills like those of a porcupine, all pointed and sharp.
I hesitated. 'Wha' am I? he roared; and his voice went up and down the echoing staircase. 'I won't put foot ev'n on doormat till I'm told wha' I am here. 'You are the the master, I said. 'But do come in. 'The mas'r! Mas'r of wha'? 'Master of the pianoforte, I answered at once. He smiled, suddenly appeased, and put his foot unsteadily on the doormat. 'Good! he said.
"Play I'm a doormat if you want to, but I cross my heart and body I didn't mean to hurt you by letting my mouth overwork at the wrong time. The Dumpling is just a sponge that sops up any old thing and lets any old body squeeze it out of her. Please say you forgive me."
"Then we will give them a dusting with our tails, and that will finish them," said Billie, and the squirrel boys did, so the black-boards were very clean. "Now it's time to go home," said Uncle Wiggily. So he locked the school, putting the key under the doormat, where the lady mouse could find it in the morning, and, with the Bushytail squirrel boys, he started off through the woods.
He remembered when he was five years old in America the faux pas of wiping his feet on a neighbor's doormat that had gotten him into trouble. He had believed then that that was what doormats were for. He again postulated that perhaps there really was no love just people who having no extrinsic value in the universe at large clung to each other for meaning.
When I read the letter I always see a vivid picture of "Jacko" coming over and down the area railings, hand over hand, and wiping his paws on the doormat! Evidently Mr. James Botten was an artist in his way and, like his employer, understood the infant mind, for does he not put the bear at the very top of his list and charges for him at the highest rate?
The moon was rising over the snow-capped peaks across the lake, and against its silver pathway the young people stood outlined. As we looked he stooped and kissed her. But it was a brief caress, as if he had just remembered the strong hand and being a doormat long enough. Tish drew a long breath. "What," she said, "is more beautiful than young love?
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