Waldhorn met him at the door, well-fed, suave, polite, a burly man, well-clad and bearing the marks of alertness and success. Always of few words, he scarcely more than spoke at present, his mildly elevated eyebrows making inquiry of the dusty man before him.
"Yes, Doctor, or—ah, Major?" he said, smilingly, insulting.
"Call it Major!" snapped Barnes. "I've come to tell you that I want your house."
"Yes? When?"
"In two minutes."
"Why?"
"I want it for Government uses. A patient of mine has come down here to stay a while—wife of one of my scouts."
"Well, now, my dear Major, I would not like to interfere with your private graft in the practice of medicine in any way. But I'm engineer in charge of this work, I fancy."
"Fancy something else while the fancying's good. Go on over to that little log house, Waldhorn. You'll live there until we send you out."
"Send me out! What do you mean, sir?"