Apart from other feelings, he was
probably glad to renew acquaintance with a man who could afford
to pay a decent doctor's bill, and through whom he might get in
touch with other desirable patrons
Presently he wrinkled his forehead, as though he had suddenly
remembered something
"Oh! Let me see!" he said. "Couldn't we postpone it? I have a
confinement this evening. I expect to be called at any moment."
We changed the date, and he departed. I was left somewhat excited
by the reminiscences that the meeting had evoked in me. I fell to
pacing the floor of my office, ruminating upon the change which
the past few years had wrought in his life and in mine. His
boastful garrulity was something new in him. Was it the struggle
for existence which was forcing it upon him? I wondered whether
that confinement story was not a fib invented to flaunt his
professional success. Thereupon I gave myself credit for my
knowledge of human nature. "That's one of the secrets of my
success," I thought. I complimented myself upon the possession of
all sorts of talents, but my keenest ambition was to be recognized
as an unerring judge of men
The amusing part of it was that in 1894, for example, I found that
in 1893 my judgment of men and things had been immature and
puerile.
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