"Hello, kids!" Edward Henry greeted them. As he had seen them before
mid-day dinner, the more formal ceremonies of salutation after
absence--so hateful to the Five Towns temperament--were happily over
and done with.
Robert turned his head slightly, inspected his father with a judicial
detachment that hardly escaped the inimical, and then resumed his
book.
("No one would think," said Edward Henry to himself, "that the
person who has just entered this room is the most enterprising and
enlightened of West End theatrical managers.")
"'Ello, father!" shrilled Ralph. "Come and help me to stand on this
wire-rope."
"It isn't a wire-rope," said Robert from the hearthrug, without
stirring, "it's a brass-rail."
"Yes, it is a wire-rope, because I can make it bend," Ralph retorted,
bumping down on the thing. "Anyhow, it's going to be a wire-rope."
Maisie simply stuck several fingers into her mouth, shifted to one
side, and smiled at her father in a style of heavenly and mischievous
flirtatiousness.
"Well, Robert, what are you reading?" Edward Henry inquired, in his
best fatherly manner--half authoritative and half humorous--while he
formed part of the staff of Ralph's circus.
"I'm not reading--I'm learning my spellings," replied Robert.
Edward Henry, knowing that the discipline of filial politeness must be
maintained, said, "'Learning my spellings'--what?"
"Learning my spellings, father," Robert consented to say, but with
a savage air of giving way to the unreasonable demands of affected
fools.
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