“Am I going as your son this time? or did you tell him—as you told Mr. Nixon—that you 'd send your young man?”
“There! listen to that!” cried the doctor, turning to Polly. “I hope you are proud of your pupil.”
She made no answer, but whispering some hurried words in her brother's ear, and pressing at the same time something into his hand, she shuffled him out of the room and closed the door.
The doctor now paced the room, so engrossed by passion that he forgot he was not alone, and uttered threats and mumbled out dark predictions with a fearful energy. Meanwhile Polly put by the books and drawings, and removed everything which might recall the late misadventure.
“What's your letter about, papa?” said she, pointing to a square-shaped envelope which he still held in his hand.
“Oh, by the way,” said he, quietly, “this is from Cob-ham. They ask us up there to dinner to-day, and to stop the night.” The doctor tried very hard to utter this speech with the unconcern of one alluding to some every-day occurrence. Nay, he did more; he endeavored to throw into it a certain air of fastidious weariness, as though to say, “See how these people will have me; mark how they persecute me with their attentions!”
Polly understood the “situation” perfectly, and it was with actual curiosity in her tone she asked, “Do you mean to go, sir?”
“I suppose we must, dear,” he said, with a deep sigh. “A professional man is no more the arbiter of his social hours than of his business ones. Cooper always said dining at home costs a thousand a year.”
“So much, papa?” asked she, with much semblance of innocence.
“I don't mean to myself,” said he, reddening, “nor to any physician in country practice; but we all lose by it, more or less.”