“I would like a word with you,” the Squire said again.
“Walk into the house.”
“No, I won't come in, as long as I've met you. I have company at home. I haven't much to say—” The Squire stopped. Jake Noyes was coming from the barn, swinging a lantern; he waited until he had led the horse away, then continued. “It is just as well to have no witnesses,” he said, laughing. “It is about that affair of the Edwards mortgage.”
“Ah!” said the doctor, with a fencing wariness of intonation.
“I would like to inquire what you're going to do about it, if you have no objection. I have reasons.”
The doctor gave a keen look at him. His face, as he stood on the steps, was on a level with the Squire's. “I am going to take the house, of course,” he said, calmly.
“It will be a blow to Mrs. Edwards and the boy.”
“It will be the best thing that could happen to him,” said the doctor, with the same clear evenness. “That sick woman and boy are not fit to have the care of a place. I shall own it, and rent it to them.”
Heat in controversy is sometimes needful to convince one's self as well as one's adversary. Doctor Prescott needed no increase of warmth to further his own arguments, so conclusive they were to his own mind.
“For how much, if I may ask? I am interested for certain reasons.”