The Five Jars Part 6

"Racing earwigs, I should think," he said, with something of contempt.

"Well, I hope they won't leave them about when they go. I don't like earwigs."

"Who does?" he said; "but they'll take them away all right; they're prize ones, some of them."

I went over and looked at the racing for a little. The course was neatly marked out with small lights sprouting out of the boards, and the circle was at the winning-post, the starters being at the other end, some six feet away. I watched one heat. The earwigs seemed to me neither very speedy nor very intelligent, and all except one were apt to stop in mid-course and engage in personal encounters with each other.

I was beginning to wonder how long this would go on, when Wag woke up.

Like most of us, he was not willing to allow that he had been asleep.

"I thought I'd just lie down a bit," he said, "and then I didn't want to bustle your cat, so I stopped there. And now I want to know--Slim, I say, what was it you were asking me?"

"Me asking you? I don't know."

"Oh, yes, you do; what he was doing the other time before we came in."

"I didn't ask you that; you asked me."

"Well, it doesn't matter who asked." (Turning to me): "What _were_ you doing?"

"I don't know," I said. "Was it these things I was using" (taking up a pack of cards), "or something like this?" (I held up a book.)

"Yes, that one. What were you doing with it? What's it for?"

"We call it reading a book," and I tried to explain what the idea was, and read out a few lines; it happened to be _Pickwick_. They were absorbed. Slim said, half to himself, "Something like a gla.s.s," which I thought quite meaningless at the time. Then I showed them a picture in another book. That they made out very quickly.

"But when's it going to move on?" said Slim.

"Never," I said. "Ours stop just like that always. Do yours move on?"

"Of course they do; look here." He lay down on the tablecloth and pressed his forehead on it, but evidently could make nothing of it.

"It's all rough," he said. I gave him a sheet of paper. "That's better;"

and he lay down again in the same posture for a few seconds. Then he got up and began rubbing the paper all over with the palms of his hands. As he did so a coloured picture came out pretty quickly, and when it was finished he drew aside to let me see, and said, somewhat bashfully, "I don't think I've got it _quite_ right, but I meant it for what happened the other evening." He had certainly not got it right as far as I was concerned. It was a view of the window of the house, seen from outside by moonlight, and there was a back view of a row of figures with their elbows on the sill. So far, so good; but inside the open window was standing a figure which was plainly--much too plainly, I thought--meant for me; far too short and fat, far too red-faced, and with an owlish expression which I am sure I never wear. This person was now seen to move his hand--a very poor hand, with only about three fingers--to his side, and pull, apparently, out of his body, a round object more or less like a watch (at any rate it was white on one side with black marks, and yellow on the other) and lay it down in front of him. At this the figures at the window-sill threw up their arms in all directions and fell or slid down like so many dolls. Then the picture began to get fainter, and disappeared from the paper. Slim looked at me expectantly.

"Well," I said, "it's very interesting to see how you do it, but is that the best likeness of me that you can make?"

"What's wrong with it?" said he. "Isn't it handsome enough or something?"

I heard Wag throw himself down on the table, and, looking at him, I saw that he had got both hands pressed over his mouth.

"May I ask what the joke is?" I said rather dryly (for it is surprising how touchy one can be over one's personal appearance, even at my time of life). He looked up for an instant at me, and then gasped and hid his face again. Slim went up to him and kicked him in the ribs.

"Where's your manners?" he said in a loud whisper. Wag rolled over and sat up, wiping his eyes.

"I'm very sorry," he said. "I'm sure I don't know what I was laughing for." Slim whistled. "Well," said Wag, "what _was_ I?"

"Him, of course, and you know perfectly well!"

"Oh, was I? Well, perhaps you'll tell me what there is to laugh at about him?" said Wag, rather basely, I thought; so, as Slim put his finger to his lip and looked unhappy, I interrupted.

"Get up a minute, Wag," I said. "I want to see something."

"What?" said he, jumping up at once.

"Stand back to back with Slim, if you don't mind. That's it. Dear me! I thought you were taller than that--you looked to me taller last night.

My mistake, I dare say. All right, thanks." But there they stood, gazing at each other with horror, and I felt I had been trifling with a most serious subject, so I laughed and said, "Don't disturb yourselves. I was only chaffing you, Wag, because you seemed to be doing something of the kind to me."

Slim understood, and heaved a sigh of relief. Wag sat down on a book and looked reproachfully upon me. Neither said a word. I was very much ashamed, and begged their pardon as nicely as I knew how. Luckily Wag was soon convinced that I was not in earnest, and he recovered his spirits directly.

"All _right_," he said, nodding at me; "did I hear you say you didn't like earwigs? That's worth remembering, Slim."

This reduced me at once; I tried to point out that he had begun it, and that it would be a mean revenge, and very hard on the earwigs, if he filled my room with them, for I should be obliged to kill all I could.

"Why," he said, "they needn't be real earwigs; my own tickle every bit as much as real ones."

This was no better for me, and I tried to make more appeals to his better feelings. He did not seem to be listening very attentively, though his eyes were fixed on me.

"What's that on your neck?" he said suddenly, and at the same moment I felt a procession of legs walking over my skin. I brushed at it hastily, and something seemed to fall on the table. "No, the other side I mean,"

said he, and again I felt the same horrid tickling and went through the same exercises, with a face, I've no doubt, contorted with terror.

Anyhow, it seemed to amuse them very much; Wag, in fact, was quite unable to speak, and could only point. It was dull of me not to have realized at once that these were "his" earwigs and not real ones. But now I did, and though I still felt the tickling, I did not move, but sat down and gazed severely at him. Soon he got the better of his mirth and said, "I think we are quits now." Then, with sudden alarm, "I say, what's become of the others? The bell hasn't gone, has it?"

"How should I know?" I said. "If you hadn't been making all this disturbance, perhaps we might have heard it."

He took a flying leap--an extraordinary feat it was--from the edge of the table to a chair in the window, scrambled up to the sill, and gazed out. "It's all right," he said, in a faint voice of infinite relief; let himself down limply to the floor, and climbed slowly up my leg to his former place.

"Well," I said, "the bell hasn't gone, it seems, but where are the rest?

I've hardly seen anything of them."

"Oh, _you_ go and find 'em, Slim; I'm worn out with all these frights."

Slim went to the farther end of the table, prospected, and returned. He reported them "all right, but they're having rather a slow time of it, I think." I, too, got up, walked round, and looked; they were seated in a solemn circle on the floor round the cat, who was now curled up and fast asleep on a round footstool. Not a word was being said by anybody. I thought I had better address them, so I said:

"Gentlemen, I'm afraid I've been very inattentive to you this evening.

Isn't there anything I can do to amuse you? Won't you come up on the table? You're welcome to walk up my leg if you find that convenient."

I was almost sorry I had spoken the moment after, for they made but one rush at my legs as I stood by the table, and the sensation was rather like that, I imagine, of a swarm of rats climbing up one's trousers.

However, it was over in a few seconds, and all of them--over a dozen--were with Wag and Slim on the table, except one, who, whether by mistake or on purpose, went on climbing me by way of my waistcoat b.u.t.tons, rather deliberately, until he reached my shoulder. I didn't object, of course, but I turned round (which made him catch at my ear) and went back to my chair, seated in which I felt rather as if I was presiding at a meeting. The one on my shoulder sat down and, I thought, folded his arms and looked at his friends with some triumph. Wag evidently took this to be a liberty.

"My word!" he said, "what do you mean by it, Wisp? Come off it!"

Wisp was a little daunted, as I judged by his fidgeting somewhat, but put a bold face on it and said, "Why should I come off?"

I put in a word: "I don't mind his being here."

"I dare say not; that's not the point," said Wag. "Are you coming down?"

"No," said Wisp, "not for you." But his tone was rather bl.u.s.tering than brave.

"Very well, don't then," said Wag; and I expected him to run up and pull Wisp down by the legs, but he didn't do that. He took something out of the breast of his tunic, put it in his mouth, lay down on his stomach, and, with his eyes on Wisp, puffed out his cheeks. Two or three seconds pa.s.sed, during which I felt Wisp s.h.i.+fting about on his perch, and breathing quickly. Then he gave a sharp shriek, which went right through my head, slipped rapidly down my chest and legs and on to the floor, where he continued to squeal and to run about like a mad thing, to the great amus.e.m.e.nt of everyone on the table.