"Fox Sanderson!"
"Yes," said Sally, again; "and when I told him that you weren't at home, he came over the wall. He brought Henrietta. He knows a lot about sauruses."
"He knows a lot about sauruses, does he?" the professor repeated thoughtfully. "It seems to me that I have some recollection of Fox Sanderson."
He turned and rummaged in a drawer of his desk. He seemed unable to find what he was looking for, and he extracted from the depths of the drawer many empty cigarette boxes, which he cast into the grate, and a handful of papers, which he dumped on the top of the desk, impatiently. He sorted these over, in the same impatient manner, and finally he found it. It was a letter and was near the bottom of the pile. He opened it and read it.
"H-mph!" he said, reading, "Thanks me for my kind permission, does he? Now, Miss Ladue, can you give me any light upon that? What permission does he refer to? Permission to do what?"
Sally shook her head. But her father was not looking.
"Oh," he said; "h-m. I must have said that I'd see him." He read on. "I must even have said that he could study with me; that I'd help him. Very thoughtless of me, very thoughtless, indeed! It must have been after—well. And he will be here in the course of three weeks." The professor turned the leaf. "This was written a month ago. So he's here, is he, Sally?"
"Yes," Sally answered, "he's here."
The professor stood, for a few moments, looking at Sally, the slight smile on his lips expressive of mingled disgust and amusement.
"Well," he observed, at last, "it appears to be one on me. I must have said it. I have a vague recollection of something of the kind, but the recollection is very vague. Do you like him, Sally?"