Now that always maddens me. Why should I be expected to know the price of gloves? I'm not a commercial traveller nor a wholesale dealer, and I don't look like one. Neither am I constitutionally parsimonious nor petty. I am a literary man, unworldly, and I wear long hair and a soft hat and a peculiar overcoat to indicate the same to ordinary people. Why, I say, should I know the price of gloves? I know they are some ordinary price, eleven-pence-halfpenny, or three-and-six, or seven-and-six, or something—one of those prices that everything is sold at—but further I don't go. Perhaps I say eleven-pence-halfpenny at a venture.
His face lights up with quiet malice. "Don't keep them, sir," he says. I can tell by his expression that I am ridiculously low and so being snubbed. I think of trying with three-and-six, or seven-and-six; the only other probable prices for things that I know, except a guinea and five pounds. Then I see the absurdity of the business, and my anger comes surging up.
"Look here!" I say, as bitterly as possible. "I don't come here to play at Guessing Games. Never mind your prices. I want some gloves. Get me some!"
This cows him a little, but very little. "May I ask your size, sir?" he says, a trifle more respectfully.
One would think I spent all my time remembering the size of my gloves. However, it is no good resenting it. "It's either seven or nine," I say in a tired way.
He just begins another question, and then he
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