14/15 I sit down by the table, lean my elbows on it, and push my fingers through my hair in most dejected musing. Polly has been dressing himself; turning his head over his shoulder, and arranging his feathers with his aquiline nose. He has finished now, and has just given vent, in a matter-of-fact, unemotional voice, to an awful oath! There is the sound of brisk feet on the sunny gravel outside. Bobby's face looks in at the window--broad, sunburnt, and laughing. "You look as if the fungi had disagreed with you!" "Then appearances are deceitful," reply I, trying to be merry, "for they have not." He has only glanced in upon us in passing: he is gone again now. |