Then he seized the wheels of his invalid chair and trundled away, too
mad to speak; and I strolled out into the parlor, still laughing.

The pretty nurse was there, sewing under a hanging lamp.

"If I am not indiscreet--" I began.

"Indiscretion is the better part of valor," said she, dropping her
head but raising her eyes.

So I sat down with a frivolous smile peculiar to the appreciated.

"Doubtless," said I, "you are hemming a 'kerchief."

"Doubtless I am not," she said; "this is a night-cap for Mr.
Halyard."

A mental vision of Halyard in a night-cap, very mad, nearly set me
laughing again.

"Like the King of Yvetot, he wears his crown in bed," I said,
flippantly.

"The King of Yvetot might have made that remark," she observed,
re-threading her needle.

It is unpleasant to be reproved. How large and red and hot a man's
ears feel.

To cool them, I strolled out to the porch; and, after a while, the