Book-bot.com - read famous books online for free

Peter: a novel of which he is not the hero by Francis Hopkinson Smith
page 25 of 474 (05%)
"Isn't it glorious, Holker!" he cried joyously, with uplifted
hands. "Oh, I'm so glad I came! I wouldn't have missed this for
anything in the world. Did you ever see anything like it? This is
classic, my boy--it has the tang and the spice of the ancients."

Morris's greeting to me was none the less hearty, although he had
left me but half an hour before.

"Late, as I expected, Major," he cried with out-stretched hand,
"and serves you right for not sitting in Peter's lap in the cab.
Somebody ought to sit on him once in a while. He's twenty years
younger already. Here, take this seat alongside of me where you
can keep him in order--they were at table when I entered. Waiter,
bring back that bottle--Just a light claret, Major--all we allow
ourselves."

As the evening wore away the charm of the room grew upon me.
Vistas hazy with tobacco smoke opened up; the ceiling lost in the
fog gave one the impression of out-of-doors--like a roof-garden at
night; a delusion made all the more real by the happy uproar. And
then the touches here and there by men whose life had been the
study of color and effects; the appointments of the table, the
massing of flowers relieving the white cloth; the placing of
shaded candles, so that only a rosy glow filtered through the
loom, softening the light on the happy faces--each scalp crowned
with chaplets of laurel tied with red ribbons: an enchantment of
color, form and light where but an hour before only the practical
and the commonplace had held sway.

No vestige of the business side of the offices remained. Peter
DigitalOcean Referral Badge