"That"s enough, David!" Anthony said.
"He started it," David submitted.
Anthony pushed on. Johnson Boller was against the bureau now--had been there for some seconds, indeed--and his expression was changing. Young David, to be sure, had rendered him slightly ridiculous for a bit, but getting mad about it was not likely to help in eliminating David.
"It"s all right, Anthony," Mr. Boller said with a sudden grim smile.
"Don"t shove me through the wall. I won"t hurt the kid."
"You"ll not lay hands on him?"
"No."
"That"s a promise?"
"Why, of course it is!" Johnson Boller said heartily.
Anthony Fry heaved a great, shaky sigh and stood back. It had not happened that time. David"s wig was still in place, and David was still David. Yet, all other things apart, what if David"s wig had slipped?
What if, during the thirty or forty years he still had to live, Anthony must have cut out Johnson Boller"s really stimulating friendship, or have listened, day in and day out, night in and night out, at every meeting and on every sly occasion, to a recital of what had happened this morning?
The strain was really growing too much. Johnson Boller would have to get out of here now and--although why was Johnson Boller smiling so sweetly?
"Quite a little boxer, kid, aren"t you?" he was asking in the most friendly fashion.
"I"ve boxed with my brother," David said.
"Made a study of it, eh?"
"So-so," said David.
They were going to have a little conversation now, which gave Anthony a minute or two for thought. First he would get Johnson Boller out of here on the plea that it was time to dress; then he would have David"s man-clothes brought, and, in one way or another, he would persuade David to don them. It could be worked, the calmer Anthony a.s.sured himself, and then--
"Well, if you"re inclined that way, there"s nothing like keeping in shape for it," Mr. Boller was saying as he fumbled at the knot of his bathrobe. "I"ll show you my back muscles and then show you how----"
"_Johnson!_" Anthony exploded.
"Well, what in the name of common sense is the matter with you?" Mr.
Boller cried.
"I--that is to say, David--your confounded back muscles don"t interest him, Johnson. Not one particle! Do they, David?"
"Not a bit!" David said faintly from the corner toward which he was backing.
"So let this physical-training rot rest!" cried the master of the apartment. "Go and dress and----"
"My dear fellow," Johnson Boller broke in mildly, "you are, so far as physical training goes, a nice old lady. But for Heaven"s sake, if you"re going to keep this boy, don"t try to bring him up along similar lines. Go look over your bean-pole anatomy, and you"ll need no further argument. This kid is young and supple, and fit to be whacked into a real man and--say, get out of here for fifteen minutes, Anthony, will you?"
"Why?"
"I"m going to strip this youngster and look him over, and then start him on the right track," Mr. Boller said with an unconscious and affectionate glance at his fist.
"Mr. Fry!" gasped David.
"Well, has this mollycoddle stuff in the air infected you, too?" Johnson Boller asked tartly. "Don"t you want to be a man?"
"No!"
Johnson Boller laughed scornfully.
"Anthony, I think your presence is a bad influence," he said. "Will you please get out of here? Shed that bathrobe, kid, and let"s see if there"s anything to you but pulp!"
"No!" said David.
"Well, I say yes, and I say it for your own good!" Johnson Boller said firmly as he advanced. "I"m going to make a man of you!"
"You can"t!" said David thinly.
"I can, boy! Believe me, I can!" Mr. Boller smiled. "Get out of that robe!"
He was advancing. Ten seconds more and he would lay violent hands on David, and Anthony Fry, with a wrench that racked his very soul, hurled back every emotion and contrived a really quiet smile. More, even; when he spoke it was in the tone of one merely amused and slightly tried in patience.
"You mean well, old chap," he said, laying a firm hand on Johnson Boller"s arm, "but you"re a crank on this gymnastic business. Don"t be absurd, please--you"re fairly frightening the boy. Later on, perhaps, when he is more accustomed to you and the surroundings, and all that sort of thing, you may take him in hand. Just now it is well past seven o"clock, and I"m hungry. Come to your senses and get dressed, Johnson, if only as a favor."
His eye was firm and steady; and having faced it for a moment, Johnson Boller shrugged his shoulders again. And yet he had not inflicted even one bruise on David, but pressing the matter now was likely to do no more than excite Anthony, and there was still time.
As head of his particular woolen concern, Johnson Boller could well spend the whole morning away from the office, so that it gained him the chance of hammering the boy to a jelly and ousting him from Johnson Boller"s temporary home. Mr. Boller, therefore, sighed a little in disappointment as he said:
"If you insist. I"d rather put the kid through his first paces naked, of course, because then one----"
"Yes, some other time, doubtless," Anthony said hastily. "Get along now, Johnson and dress."
They were alone again, Anthony and David.
David"s color was decidedly higher, and his eyes burned with a mixture of fright and indignation, while the bathrobe was clutched defensively about his throat. Anthony himself had lost his pallor, and on his high, thoughtful forehead a glistening glaze had come into being. He dabbed it away with his handkerchief and glanced fearfully toward the door.
"This is--er--most embarra.s.sing!" he breathed.
"It is for me!" said the apparent David. "What"s the matter with that man?"
"He has his own ideas about most things," Anthony said with a shudder.
"However, he is out of the way now and--er--the next thing is to get you out, also."
"Well?"
"I am sorry, Miss Mary, truly sorry if it displeases you," Anthony went on carefully; "but there is really only one way for you to leave quite safely. This house, you see, is rather different from other houses. It would be possible to send for your--ah--proper clothing and have you leave as the doubtless prepossessing young woman that you are; but to do that you would have to pa.s.s through the office downstairs, and the elevator men would know that you came from this apartment."
"Ah?" said Mary, without expression.
"And inasmuch as every one here knows that I"m not married, and that I have no female relatives or even friends of your age, the--ah--very painful inference----"