It seemed likely
that this process might continue for an hour or more, until the entire
regiment had shifted its quarters, had not the door opened, and the
young man, who was inclined to be stout, come in with large naked feet.
"Oh, Hirst, what I forgot to say was--"
"Two minutes," said Hirst, raising his finger.
He safely stowed away the last words of the paragraph.
"What was it you forgot to say?" he asked.
"D'you think you _do_ make enough allowance for feelings?" asked Mr.
Hewet. He had again forgotten what he had meant to say.
After intense contemplation of the immaculate Gibbon Mr. Hirst smiled at
the question of his friend. He laid aside his book and considered.
"I should call yours a singularly untidy mind," he observed. "Feelings?
Aren't they just what we do allow for? We put love up there, and all the
rest somewhere down below." With his left hand he indicated the top of a
pyramid, and with his right the base.
"But you didn't get out of bed to tell me that," he added severely.
"I got out of bed," said Hewet vaguely, "merely to talk I suppose."
"Meanwhile I shall undress," said Hirst. When naked of all but his
shirt, and bent over the basin, Mr. Hirst no longer impressed one with
the majesty of his intellect, but with the pathos of his young yet ugly
body, for he stooped, and he was so thin that there were dark lines
between the different bones of his neck and shoulders.
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