UPON A CARPET
peering over the banister to him appealing a fresh difficulty. It might have been his house and his opinion the most valued one in it. He was carpenter and maid in one. Standing aloft, invoking the devils of dizziness, he swept cobwebs from high ceilings. He moved monumental masses of walnut; he drew endless tacks; and it was in his arms that the carpet of fabulous flowers made its exit from the drawing-room and was hung in the sun. A pillar of dust stood out around it and in the core of this, like a genius of blows, Carron wrought, tireless.
"What in the world do you do, when I am not here?" he demanded egotistically, as Blanche Rader, coming out with a lesser piece of carpet, paused within the smoke of his labor. She had changed her riding things to a blouse of white cotton stuff, and a skirt, striped red and white, like a market girl.
"O, we hang them out overnight," she said, "and in the morning Bert Ferrier gives them a beating, but nothing like this!" she added in admiration.
Carron lifted one eyebrow. That accomplishment was all there was left him of a scar which had brought him near to death. "So, I am standing in his shoes?"
"O, no, they would be much too small for you."
He looked hard at her. Had she intended that double meaning? "I would much rather have my
147
