"keep the boy at home." It
didn't, of course, not a bit. Ellis is a pretty good player, but he did
nearly all his practising at his club. I've often heard his mother
regret the eighty pounds odd that that billiard-table cost.... _I_ play
a bit, you know. Nellie Smith would not try at first, and Papa Smith was
smoking a cigar and he said he couldn't do justice to a cigar and a cue
at the same time. So Ellis and I had a twenty-five up. He gave me ten
and I beat him--probably because he would keep on smoking cigarettes,
just to show Papa Smith how well he could keep the smoke out of his
eyes. Then he asked Nellie if she'd "try." She said she would if her pa
would. And she and her pa put themselves against Ellis and me.

Well, I'll cut it short. That girl, with her pink-and-white
complexion--she began right off with a break of twenty-eight. You should
have seen Ellis's face. It was the funniest thing I ever saw in my life.
I can't remember anything that ever struck me as half so funny. It seems
that they have plenty of time for billiards out in Winnipeg, and a very
high-class table. After a while Ellis saw the funniness of it too. He
made a miss and then he said:

"Will someone kindly take me out and bury me?"

That kind of speech is supposed to be very smart at his club. And the
Smiths thought it was very smart too. Nellie and her pa beat us hollow,
and then Nellie began to take her pa to task for showing off with too
much screw instead of using the natural angle!

Ellis went to bed. He was very struck by Nellie's talents. But he went
to bed. Probably he wanted to think things over, and consider how he
could be impressive with her. I should like to have broken it to him
about his blue suit, because it was Sunday the next day, and Nellie was
bound to be gorgeous for chapel and the pier, and I felt sure he'd be
really glad to have that suit--whatever he might _say_ to me. And I
wanted him to wear it too. But there was no chance for me to tell him.
He went off to bed like a streak of lightning. And usually, you know, he
simply will not go to bed. Nothing will induce him to go to bed, just as
nothing will induce him to get up. I said to myself I would send the
suit into his room early in the morning with a note. I did want him to
look his best.

And then of course there was the fire. The fire was that very night.
What?...

III

Do you actually mean to sit there and tell me you never heard about the
fire at Hawtho