“Hello! You here?”
“Just to give an off-hand opinion, I should say I am.” Old Hosie smiled sweetly, put his hat back upon the piano and sank into his chair. “I just dropped in to tell Miss Katherine some of those very clever and cutting things you’ve said to me about the idea of a woman being a lawyer. I’ve been expostulating with her—trying to show her the error of her ways—trying to prove to her that she wasn’t really clever and didn’t have the first qualification for law.”
“You please let me speak for myself!” retorted Bruce. “How long are you going to stay here?”
Old Hosie recrossed his long legs and settled back with the air of the rock of ages.
“Why, I was expecting Miss Katherine was going to invite me to stay to supper.”
“Well, I guess you won’t. You please remember this is your month to look after Jim. Now you trot along home and see that he don’t fry the steak to a shingle the way you let him do it last night.”
“Last night I was reading your editorial on the prospects of the corn crop and I got so worked up as to how it was coming out that I forgot all about that wooden-headed nigger. I tell you, Arn, that editorial was one of the most exciting, stirring, nerve-racking, hair-breadth——”
“Come, get along with you!” Bruce interrupted impatiently. “I want to talk some business with Miss West!”
Old Hosie rose.