"Don't fidget!" roared Van Diest, emitting a cloud of tobacco smoke.
"Don't smoke!" Richard countered in the same tone.
"I shmoke on purpose."
"And I fidget on purpose."
With a sweep of the hand he sent the tray with a crashing to the floor.
"Ach! Ach! Ach!" cried Van Diest, and was almost choked with a violent attack of coughing.
"I make you to speak! I make you to speak! What if I burn you with my cigar—what if I——" he stopped abruptly and dropped his voice almost to a whine. "You don't know how goot I make myself to you. I wass a very kind man. At my home I keep the birds."
"Poor darlings," said Richard.
"The canaries; and you look what I haf here. A portrait of my little granddaughter Sibelle. She sit on my knee the Sunday afternoon and listen to the tale of Hansell and Grethel. She call me Grandparkins."
Richard swept the photograph aside with the back of his hand.