No More Learning

"Always with Mrs. Hauksbee! " murmured Mrs. Mallowe, with her sweetest
smile, to Otis. "Oh you men, you men! Here are our Punjabis growling
because you've monopolized the nicest woman in Simla. They'll tear you
to pieces on the Mall, some day, Mr. Yeere. "

Mrs. Mallowe rattled down-hill, having satisfied herself, by a glance
through the fringe of her sunshade, of the effect of her words.

The shot went home. Of a surety Otis Yeere was somebody in this
bewildering whirl of Simla--had monopolized the nicest woman in it and
the Punjabis were growling. The notion justified a mild glow of vanity.
He had never looked upon his acquaintance with Mrs. Hauksbee as a matter
for general interest.
The knowledge of envy was a pleasant feeling to the man of no account.
It was intensified later in the day when a luncher at the Club said,
spitefully, "Well, for a debilitated Ditcher, Yeere, you are going it.
Hasn't any kind friend told you that she's the most dangerous woman in
Simla? "

Yeere chuckled and passed out. When, oh when, would his new clothes be
ready? He descended into the Mall to inquire; and Mrs. Hauksbee,
coming over the Church Ridge in her 'rickshaw, looked down upon him
approvingly. "He's learning to carry himself as if he were a man,
instead of a piece of furniture, and"--she screwed up her eyes to see
the better through the sunlight--"he is a man when he holds himself like
that. Oh blessed Conceit, what should we be without you? "

With the new clothes came a new stock of self-confidence. Otis Yeere
discovered that he could enter a room without breaking into a gentle
perspiration--could cross one, even to talk to Mrs. Hauksbee, as though
rooms were meant to be crossed. He was for the first time in nine years
proud of himself, and contented with his life, satisfied with his new
clothes, and rejoicing in the friendship of Mrs. Hauksbee.

"Conceit is what the poor fellow wants," she said in confidence to Mrs.
Mallowe.