FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133  
134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   >>   >|  
d the evening paper, or his latest short story, and Edith's sewing basket showed how she put in what women miscall their leisure. I did not go to sleep at once: naturally the rather vital step I had taken in the library insisted on being considered and almost regretted. I tried reading myself to sleep, and when that failed, I tried the soothing combination of a cigarette and a book. That worked like a charm; the last thing I remember is of holding the cigarette in a death grip as I lay with my pillows propped back of me, my head to the light, and a delightful languor creeping over me. I was wakened by the pungent acrid smell of smoke, and I sat up and blinked my eyes open. The side of the bed was sending up a steady column of gray smoke, and there was a smart crackle of fire under me somewhere. I jumped out of bed and saw the trouble instantly. My cigarette had dropped from my hand, still lighted, and as is the way with cigarettes, determined to burn to the end. In so doing it had fired my bed, the rug under the bed and pretty nearly the man on the bed. It took some sharp work to get it all out without rousing the house. Then I stood amid the wreckage and looked ruefully at Edith's pretty room. I could see, mentally, the spot of water on the library ceiling the next morning, and I could hear Fred's strictures on the heedlessness and indifference to property of bachelors in general and me in particular. Three pitchers of water on the bed had made it an impossible couch. I put on a dressing-gown, and, with a blanket over my arm, I went out to hunt some sort of place to sleep. I decided on the davenport in the hall just outside, and as quietly as I could, I put a screen around it and settled down for the night. I was wakened by the touch of a hand on my face. I started, I think, and the hand was jerked away--I am not sure: I was still drowsy. I lay very quiet, listening for footsteps, but none came. With the feeling that there was some one behind the screen, I jumped up. The hall was dark and quiet. When I found no one I concluded it had been only a vivid dream, and I sat down on the edge of the davenport and yawned. I heard Edith moving back in the nursery: she has an uncomfortable habit of wandering around in the night, covering the children, closing windows, and sniffing for fire. I was afraid some of the smoke from my conflagration had reached her suspicious nose, but she did not come into the front hall.
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133  
134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
cigarette
 

jumped

 

screen

 
wakened
 
davenport
 
library
 

pretty

 

strictures

 

decided

 

ceiling


ruefully
 
mentally
 

heedlessness

 

morning

 

blanket

 

impossible

 

dressing

 

pitchers

 

bachelors

 

property


general
 

indifference

 

yawned

 
moving
 

nursery

 
concluded
 
suspicious
 

closing

 

reached

 

windows


sniffing

 

afraid

 
children
 
covering
 

uncomfortable

 
wandering
 

jerked

 

looked

 

conflagration

 

started


settled

 

drowsy

 
feeling
 

listening

 
footsteps
 
quietly
 

determined

 

failed

 
soothing
 

combination