Jimmy reserved his opinion and went off to his train.
The lawyer went back into his study, knelt on the floor, lifted the lid of the ottoman with his right hand, put the fingers of his left upon the open under lip of that piece of furniture to steady himself, and gazed quizzically and sadly at the Green Overcoat.
"A beast!" he said. "A fate-bearing, disreputable beast!"
But even as he said it the heavy lid slipped from the palm of his right hand. He had but just time to withdraw his left hand before it crashed down.
Mr. Kirby got up a little shakily. He was a man of imagination, and he winced internally as he thought of crushed fingers.
"Try that on again!" he murmured, wagging his head savagely at the Green Overcoat where it basked hidden within the ottoman; "try that on again, and I 'll rip you up!"
With that he switched off the light and made his way to bed, maturing his plans for tomorrow. Rut he rather wished he had some outhouse or other in which to hide the garment. He felt a little afraid of all sorts of things—for instance, fire.
