Tommy and Co.

by Jerome K. Jerome




STORY THE FIRST--Peter Hope plans his Prospectus



"Come in!" said Peter Hope.

Peter Hope was tall and thin, clean-shaven but for a pair of side
whiskers close-cropped and terminating just below the ear, with
hair of the kind referred to by sympathetic barbers as "getting a
little thin on the top, sir," but arranged with economy, that
everywhere is poverty's true helpmate. About Mr. Peter Hope's
linen, which was white though somewhat frayed, there was a self-
assertiveness that invariably arrested the attention of even the
most casual observer. Decidedly there was too much of it--its
ostentation aided and abetted by the retiring nature of the cut-
away coat, whose chief aim clearly was to slip off and disappear
behind its owner's back. "I'm a poor old thing," it seemed to say.
"I don't shine--or, rather, I shine too much among these up-to-date
young modes. I only hamper you. You would be much more
comfortable without me." To persuade it to accompany him, its
proprietor had to employ force, keeping fastened the lowest of its
three buttons. At every step, it struggled for its liberty.
Another characteristic of Peter's, linking him to the past, was his