City Boy Read Online Free PDF

was as clearly in command in matters of diet, furniture, clothing, and etiquette as she was subordinate in everything else.
    Herbie's first feeling upon opening the door to the terrible visitor was disappointment at his size. In the assemblies, and behind his desk, Mr. Gauss gave the impression of skyscraping grandeur, but he managed to pass through the doorway without crouching. He was corpulent, and rather shiny of visage. His mouth, Herbie observed, was fixed in a peculiar smile, consisting of a straight, thin line of lips pushed upward at both ends and apparently held so by a pair of firm invisible fingers.
    “Good evening, Master Bookbinder,” said the principal loudly, his mouth retaining the shape of the smile as it opened. “I trust your good dad and mother are expecting me?”
    “Yes, sir,” the boy mumbled, and led the way to the parlor. His good dad was standing by the upright piano (Felicia's chief sorrow in life) looking fully as wooden, upright, and hard to play upon as the instrument. Mr. Gauss, by way of compensating, unbent to the verge of slumping out of human shape as he exchanged greetings with the parent. The two men sat down on the red velours-covered sofa, driving a couple of feathers into the air through a seam Mrs. Bookbinder had planned to mend that very evening.
    “Allow me to say, Mr. Bookbinder,” began the principal, “that you have a wonderful daughter and a very wonderful son. Absolutely outstanding children, both of them.”
    “Their mother signs the report cards, so I wouldn't know,” said Jacob Bookbinder, putting one hand in a jacket pocket and leaning back on the other in an awkward, self-conscious way.
    “Absolutely outstanding. I keep my eye out for these outstanding children, you know. I want to remember in later years when they're grown up and famous that a very little bit of their success—just a very little bit—is due to the molding they received at my hands when they were still in the childhood state of impressionable clay.”
    “Education is a fine thing,” answered the father, not being able to think of a more noncommittal remark.
    “You have stated it in a nutshell,” said Mr. Gauss. “My one sorrow is—”
    Mrs. Bookbinder appeared, splendid in a red silk gown. Her face was newly powdered, her hair carefully arranged, and a long double string of amber beads clicked on her bosom. The men stood.
    “And this is Mrs. Bookbinder, I'm sure,” cried the principal, with an immensely happy smile. “No mistaking the resemblance to little Herbie.”
    “It is an honor and a privilege to welcome you to our home, Mr. Gauss,” said the mother with a formal little bow.
    “An honor and a privilege to be here, I assure you,” said the principal, returning the bow with a nice mixture of grandeur and humbleness. As they all sat Mr. Gauss proceeded, “I have just been telling Mr. Bookbinder that you have a wonderful daughter and a very wonderful son. Absolutely outstanding children, both of them.”
    Herbie noticed the repetition of the extra adjective “very” applied to himself, and while it pleased him, he calculated that it might be due to the fact that he, not Felicia, had invited the principal to visit. He was already in an agony of fear that Mr. Gauss might reveal his rash deed, so the extra praise made him more uneasy than otherwise. But Mr. Gauss's motive was really much simpler. He knew that parents usually set more store by sons than daughters, and distributed his adjectives on that basis.
    “And I was telling Mr. Bookbinder,” he went on, “that I like to keep my eye on these outstanding children so that in after years when they are famous—as I'm quite sure Herbie will be—”
    Mrs. Bookbinder turned to beam at her boy. Herbie was making a careful study of the wan roses and foliage in the carpet.
    “—I will be able to remember that I contributed a tiny, just a tiny bit to their success by molding them while they were still in the childhood state of