"And, Miss Gaskett," the deadly coldness of his voice made her shiver, "I doubt if the fuzz under your bed has troubled you as much as the fact that for three summers your cat has had kittens in the linen closet has annoyed me."
The Baltimore widow had his attention:
"It is possible that the drip from your faucet and the squeak in your rocking-chair gets on your nerves, my dear lady, but not more than your daily caterwauling on the hotel piano gets on mine.
"I shall miss your check, certainly, Mr. Appel, but not nearly so much as I shall enjoy the relief from listening to the story of the way you got your start as a 'breaker-boy' in the coal region."
He bowed with the irony of Mephistopheles to Mrs. Budlong:
"Instead of discharging the man with the vacuum cleaner, I shall give him for his large family the cake and fruit you would have carried away from the table in your capacious pocket if you had been here."
His eyes swept them all.
He would have given Mr. Budlong his attention, but that person's vanishing back was all he could see of him, so he turned to the others and shouted:
"Go! The sooner the better. Get out of my sight—the lot of you! I'm going to a rest cure!"
His hand travelled toward the potato he used as a pen-wiper and there was something so significant in the action when taken in connection with his menacing expression that, without a word, they obeyed him.