"That's enough," he broke in, and putting down his pen, went to the front window and looked out. "I wonder if he is gone yet," he said, speaking more to himself than to me. "I repented of my action of last night, but now I wish I had kicked him down stairs. I wonder how long God wants me to put up with that fellow."
"If I am allowed an opinion, sir," I replied, "I don't think that God takes him into account."
He looked at me with a smile. "You are allowed that opinion and I will help you entertain it," he said, and a moment later he added: "Come down with me and get something to eat."
The front hall door stood open and as we turned the bend in the stairs we saw the doctor driving off from the gate. Old Master came up the steps from the hall. "I see he's gone," said the young man.
"Yes, thank God," Old Master replied. "There's only one way that Bates has given me pleasure and that is to see him driving away. But I don't think he's as bad as he used to be. He used to worry the life out of me with trying to buy Dan when he might have known that it was against my principles to sell a slave."
"It's not against my principles to sell anything that annoys me," said Old Miss, coming out with her keys jangling. "As for you, General, you are always willing enough to get rid of white men but you stick close enough to your negroes. Dan," she added, "I want you to take up the sitting-room carpet and beat it."
"Mother," Young Master interposed, "he has had no breakfast. And besides, that is not his work."
"Any work that I tell him to do is his," Old Miss replied, drawing her thin lips together. I gave her a bow of most humble obedience, not that I felt any reverence for her, but that I would protect Young Master against all spiteful upbraiding. "Dan," she said, "tell Tilly to give you something to eat, and then I want you to beat that carpet."
I looked at Bob and he nodded assent, gracefully enough, but I could see that he was not at all pleased. I was turning away when his voice arrested me, though his words were addressed to his mother. "At times I have an odd fancy," said he. "When I am making a speech in my mind and a coldness chills my words, I imagine that the chill is an inheritance from you, mother."
Old Master laughed, and pressed his bony fingers till his knuckles cracked. But Old Miss did not make a laughing matter of it; perhaps she felt the sting of its truth. "It's a singular thing," she replied, "that so cold a mother should bring up so warm a son. General, I wish you wouldn't grin at me that way!"