A careless guardian was he of the treasures confided to him.
The crowd passed in Chepe; he never marked it. The sun shone on Chepe;
he only asked that it should illumine the page he read. The knave might
filch his treasures; he was heedless of the knave. The customer might
enter; but his book was all in all to him.
And indeed a customer WAS there; a little hand was tapping on the
counter with a pretty impatience; a pair of arch eyes were gazing at
the boy, admiring, perhaps, his manly proportions through the homely and
tightened garments he wore.
"Ahem! sir! I say, young man!" the customer exclaimed.
"Ton d'apameibomenos prosephe," read on the student, his voice choked
with emotion. "What language!" he said; "how rich, how noble, how
sonorous! prosephe podas--"
The customer burst out into a fit of laughter so shrill and cheery, that
the young Student could not but turn round, and blushing, for the first
time remarked her. "A pretty grocer's boy you are," she cried, "with
your applepiebomenos and your French and lingo. Am I to be kept waiting
for hever?"
"Pardon, fair Maiden," said he, with high-bred courtesy: "'twas not
French I read, 'twas the Godlike language of the blind old bard. In
what can I be serviceable to ye, lady?" and to spring from his desk, to
smooth his apron, to stand before her the obedient Shop Boy, the Poet no
more, was the work of a moment.
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