Arrowsmith - Sinclair Lewis [74]
“If you’re going driving, don’t forget that supper is six o’clock sharp,” Mrs. Tozer had said, smiling to sugar-coat it.
On Main Street, Mr. Tozer waved to them and shouted, “Be back by six. Supper at six o’clock sharp.”
Bert Tozer ran out from the bank, like a country schoolmaster skipping from a one-room schoolhouse, and cackled, “Say, you folks better not forget to be back at six o’clock for supper or the Old Man’ll have a fit. He’ll expect you for supper at six o’clock sharp, and when he says six o’clock SHARP, he means six o’clock SHARP, and not five minutes past six!”
“Now that,” observed Leora, “is funny, because in my twenty-two years in Wheatsylvania I remember three different times when supper was as late as seven minutes after six. Let’s get out of this, Sandy. . . . I wonder were we so wise to live with the family and save money?”
Before they had escaped from the not very extensive limits of Wheatsylvania they passed Ada Quist, the future Mrs. Bert Tozer, and through the lazy air they heard her voice slashing: “Better be home by six.”
Martin would be heroic. “We’ll by golly get back when we’re by golly good and ready!” he said to Leora; but on them both was the cumulative dread of the fussing voices, beyond every breezy prospect was the order, “Be back at six sharp”; and they whipped up to arrive at eleven minutes to six, as Mr. Tozer was returning from the creamery, full thirty seconds later than usual.
“Glad to see you among us,” he said. “Hustle now and get that horse in the livery stable. Supper’s at six — sharp!”
Martin survived it sufficiently to sound domestic when he announced at the supper-table:
“We had a bully drive. I’m going to like it here. Well, I’ve loafed for a day and a half, and now I’ve got to get busy. First thing is, I must find a location for my office. What is there vacant, Father Tozer?”
Mrs. Tozer said brightly, “Oh, I have such a nice idea, Martin. Why can’t we fix up an office for you out in the barn? It’d be so handy to the house, for you to get to meals on time, and you could keep an eye on the house if the girl was out and Ory and I went out visiting or to the Embroidery Circle.”
“In the barn!”
“Why, yes, in the old harness room. It’s partly ceiled, and we could put in some nice tar paper or even beaver board.”
“Mother Tozer, what the dickens do you think I’m planning to do? I’m not a hired man in a livery stable, or a kid looking for a place to put his birds’ eggs! I was thinking of opening an office as a physician!”
Bert made it all easy: “Yuh, but you aren’t much of a physician yet. You’re just getting your toes in.”
“I’m one hell of a good physician! Excuse me for cussing, Mother Tozer, but — Why, nights in the hospital, I’ve held hundreds of lives in my hand! I intend —”
“Look here, Mart,” said Bertie. “As we’re putting up the money — I don’t want to be a tightwad but after all, a dollar is a dollar — if we furnish the dough, we’ve got to decide the best way to spend it.”
Mr. Tozer looked thoughtful and said helplessly, “That’s so. No sense taking a risk, with the blame farmers demanding all the money they can get for their wheat and cream, and then deliberately going to work and not paying the interest on their loans. I swear, it don’t hardly pay to invest in mortgages any longer. No sense putting on lugs. Stands to reason you can look at a fellow’s sore throat or prescribe for an ear-ache just as well in a nice simple little office as in some fool place all fixed up like a Moorhead saloon. Mother will see you have a comfortable corner in the barn —”
Leora intruded: “Look here, Papa. I want you to lend us one thousand dollars, outright, to use as we see fit.” The sensation was immense. “We’ll pay you six per cent — no, we won’t; we’ll pay you five; that’s enough.”
“And mortgages bringing six, seven, and eight!” Bert quavered.
“Five’s enough. And we want our own say,