“I was going to, but you’ve got your confounded papers all over the table, so I don’t see how I can very well,” answered the man, in surly tones.
“I’ll make a place for you at once,” said the doctor hastily, sweeping the papers to one side.
“You needn’t bother,” was the man’s ungracious remark. “I can go somewhere else. I wish you, wouldn’t make such a muss.”
“But this is about my new book.”
“I don’t care what it is.”
The doctor seemed to shrink away from Mr. Barton Sandow, and Tom felt a natural resentment against a man who would speak so ungraciously to an aged person.
“Allow me to present a friend of mine to you,” went on the physician courteously. “This is Tom Baldwin, Mr. Sandow. Tom, or I suppose I should say Thomas, this is my brother-in-law. That is he is a sort of brother-in-law. His wife was my brother’s wife, but my brother has been dead several years, and his wife married again.”
“You needn’t go into the whole family history,” said Barton Sandow surlily. “How are you?” he added to Tom, but his tone of voice was such that he might as well have told the boy he did not care whether he was well or ill.
“I—I wasn’t going to,” said the doctor gently. “I only thought—I—er—and—er—” he seemed to forget what he was going to say.
“Did you call on business?” asked Mr. Sandow suddenly, looking at Tom. “Dr. Spidderkins evidently has forgotten what it is about,” he added with a sneer.