There is no stolidity so
utter as that of a waterless tap.
'Confound it!' said Elizabeth.
She passed through the dining-room to the foot of the stairs.
'Nutty!'
There was no reply.
'Nutty, my precious lamb!'
Upstairs in the room next to her own a long, spare form began to
uncurl itself in bed; a face with a receding chin and a small
forehead raised itself reluctantly from the pillow, and Claude
Nutcombe Boyd signalized the fact that he was awake by scowling at
the morning sun and uttering an aggrieved groan.
Alas, poor Nutty! This was he whom but yesterday Broadway had
known as the Speed Kid, on whom head-waiters had smiled and lesser
waiters fawned; whose snake-like form had nestled in so many a
front-row orchestra stall.
Where were his lobster Newburgs now, his cold quarts that were
wont to set the table in a roar?
Nutty Boyd conformed as nearly as a human being may to Euclid's
definition of a straight line. He was length without breadth. From
boyhood's early day he had sprouted like a weed, till now in the
middle twenties he gave startled strangers the conviction that it
only required a sharp gust of wind to snap him in half. Lying in
bed, he looked more like a length of hose-pipe than anything else.
While he was unwinding himself the door opened and Elizabeth came
into the room.
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