“I have thought about the invention for some time.”
Mr. Barton Swift threw up his hands in mock despair.
“Incurable!” he cried. “Once you get your teeth set in a thing, Tom, there is no shaking you loose.”
“I come honestly enough by that trait of character,” said Tom, with a grin. “They say I’m a chip off the old block.”
He sat up suddenly in his reclining chair and stared toward the front of the house. Idly at first he had heard the noise of a motor-car arriving before the house. It had stopped there. Mr. Swift had not appeared to notice it at all, but Tom suddenly overheard voices.
“Yes, sah. Dey is at home, but dey mebbe is engaged on ’portant business,” said a sonorous voice that could belong to nobody save Koku, Tom’s giant servant whom the young inventor had brought with him some years before from far parts, and who had served him well and faithfully ever since.
“I isn’t sure, sah. But I go see,” went on the important sounding Koku.
“Listen to dat giant!” grumbled old Rad Sampson. “Jes’ to hear him, yo’d think he was bossin’ dis hyer fambly. Sho’ nuff! Huh!”
The ancient colored man and the half-civilized Koku were sworn enemies up to a certain point. Both professed to scorn the other’s efficiency and abilities. And both usurped the authority of speaking for either Tom or his father on almost any occasion.
But now Koku had tried the patience of the visitor. Overtopping the giant’s serious tones came the sharper and more excited voice that Tom immediately recognized. And what the voice said startled even the placid Mr. Swift.