“That was my intention.”
“Very well. Please clear off that table and find a chair.... You may smoke!”
“I do not use tobacco.”
She shrugged her shoulders, and again he flushed as if he had been detected in something mildly shameful. “I am wondering,” she said, “how you can be of use.”
“I can at least see to it that simple words are correctly spelled in this paper,” he said.
“So can Tubal, given time and a dictionary.... What have you done all your life? What experience have you had?”
He cleared his throat. “I entered the university at the age of sixteen,” he said, “by special dispensation.”
“An infant prodigy,” she interrupted. “I’ve often read about these boys who enter college when they should be playing marbles, and I’ve always wondered what became of them.”
“I have always been informed,” he said, severely, “that I was an exceptionally brilliant child.... Since I entered college and until I came here a year ago I have been endeavoring to educate myself adequately. Before I was twenty I received both LL.B. and A.B. Subsequently I took my master’s degree. I have also worked for my D.C.L., my Ph.D....”
She interrupted again. “With what end in view?” she asked.