"I do not doubt it. But, first, is there any other place where we can talk?"
"Don't you like this?" innocently.
The Button-Moulder's look of surprised anguish was sufficient answer.
Callandar laughed.
"You always were a bit narrow in your views, Willits. How often have I impressed upon you that beauty depends upon understanding? I don't suppose you have even tried to understand this room? No? Will it help any if I tell you that Mrs. Sykes went without a spring bonnet that she might purchase the deep gold frame which enshrines Victoria the Good, or if I explain that Joseph Sykes, deceased, whose name you see yonder upon that engraved plate, was the most worthless rogue unhung. Yet the silver which displays—"
"Not in the least," interrupted the other hastily. "The place is a nightmare. Nothing can excuse it! And you—how you stand it I cannot see."
"My dear man, I don't stand it. I am not allowed to. It's only upon special occasions that any one is allowed to stand this room. You are a special occasion. But as you seem so unappreciative we can adjourn to my office if you wish."
"You have an office?"
"Certainly. A doctor has to have an office. This way."
Callandar strode across the room and opened a door in the opposite wall. It led into another room, smaller, with no veranda in front of it, yet with a window looking toward the road and two side windows through which the after flush of sunrise streamed. Its door opened upon a small stone stoop set in the grass of the front lawn. The furniture of the room was plain, not to say severe. Cool matting covered the painted floor, hemstitched curtains of linen scrim hung at the windows. There was a businesslike desk, a couch, a reclining chair, a stool by the door; another chair, straight and uncompromising, behind the desk. That was all.
Willits looked around him in a kind of dazed surprise. "Office!" he kept murmuring. "Office!"