She stopped rocking herself, and said imperatively, “Will you please put that back, Dr. Morrell?”
“This paper-knife?”
“Yes. And not look at me just in that way? When you get that knife and that look, I feel a little too much as if you were diagnosing me.”
“Diagnosticating,” suggested the doctor.
“Is it? I always supposed it was diagnosing. But it doesn't matter. It wasn't the name I was objecting to.”
He put the knife back and changed his posture, with a smile that left nothing of professional scrutiny in his look. “Very well, then; you shall diagnose yourself.”
“Diagnosticate, please.”
“Oh, I thought you preferred the other.”
“No, it sounds undignified, now that I know there's a larger word. Where was I?”
“The personal bearing of the question whether life isn't more and more complicated?”