"I think you're a sassy boy!" replied Mrs. Tree, with vivacity. "I think children should speak when they're spoken to; that's what I think."

She clicked some castanets in her throat, which was her way of laughing.

"But you didn't speak to me," said Geoffrey. "You wouldn't speak. Do you suppose I was going to wait all the evening? What a wonderful cap you've got, Mrs. Tree! I'm going to have one made exactly like it. Will you go in to supper with me? Do! I want to cut out the minister, and he is coming to ask you now. I am much more amusing than he is, you know I am."

Mrs. Tree did know it. The minister was waved off, and the oldest parishioner sailed in to supper on Doctor Strong's arm.

"Why don't you get married," she asked on the way, "instead of fooling around old folks this way? If I was your ma'am, I'd find a wife for ye, first thing I did. You're too sassy to stay unmarried."

"Miss Vesta won't have me," said Geoffrey; "and I won't have anybody else, unless you will relent, Mrs. Tree. Now, what do you want? lobster salad? Well, I shall not give you that. If you eat it you will be ill tomorrow, and then Direxia will send for me, and you will throw my medicine out of the window and get well without it, and then laugh in my face. I know you! have some escalloped oysters, there's a dear!"

"I wish't I'd come in with the minister now!" said Mrs. Tree.

"I don't believe a word of it!" said Geoffrey. "It's much less dangerous for you to flirt with me, you know it is; though even now Miss Phoebe is looking at us very seriously, Mrs. Tree, very seriously indeed."

"If I was Phoebe, I'd send you to bed!" said Mrs. Tree. "That's what I'd do!"



CHAPTER VIII.

REVELATION

It was a perfect evening. The water lay like rosy glass under the sinking sun. Not a breath of air was stirring, and even on the beach the ripple did not break, merely whispered itself away in foam. The canoe moved easily, when it did move, under a practised stroke, but much of the time it lay at ease, rocking a little now and then as a swell rose and melted under it. Vesta lay among her pillows at one end, and Geoffrey faced her. Her face was turned toward the west, and he wondered whether it was only the sunset glow that touched it, or whether the faint rosy flush belonged there. Certainly the waxen hue was gone; certainly the girl was wonderfully better. But he did not look at her much, because it got into his breathing somehow. He had not been paddling for a year, and he was "soft," of course; nothing surprising in that.

He was telling her about some of his patients. The thing that did surprise him was the interest she seemed to take; active, intelligent interest. Being sick herself, perhaps, gave her a natural sympathy; and she certainly had extraordinary intelligence, even insight. Singular thing for a girl to have!

"But what became of the poor little fellow? did he live? better not, I am sure. I hope he did not."

"Yes; almost a pity, but he did live. Got well, too, after a fashion, but he'll never be able to do anything."

The girl was silent. Presently—"I wonder whether it is worth while to get well after a fashion!" she said. "I wonder if it's worth while to go on living and never be able to do anything. I suppose I shall find out."

"You!" said the young doctor. "You will be entirely well in a year, Miss Blyth; I'd be willing to wager it."

Vesta shook her head.

"No!" she said. "The spring is broken. There is nothing real the matter with me, I know that well enough. It's nothing but nerves— and heart, and mind; nothing but the whole of my life broken and thrown aside."

She spoke bitterly, and Geoffrey felt a pang of compassion. She was so young, and so pretty—beautiful was the word, rather. It seemed too cruel. If only she would not say anything more about it! How could she? was it because he was a physician? He would go and be a costermonger if that—

"You see," she went on, slowly; "I cared so tremendously. I had thought of nothing else for years, dreamed of nothing else. All there was of me went into it. And then, then—when this came; when he told me—I—it was pretty hard."

The quiver in her voice was controlled instantly, but it was almost worse than the sobs. Geoffrey broke out, fiercely:

"I don't know whether this man is more a beast or a devil; but I know that he is not fit to live, and I wish I—"

Vesta looked up at him in surprise. His face was crimson; his angry eyes looked beyond her, above her, anywhere except at her.

"I don't know what you mean!" she said. "He was neither. He was kind, oh, very kind. He did it as tenderly as possible. I shall always be grateful—" the quiver came again, and she stopped.

"Oh!" cried Geoffrey. He drove his paddle savagely into the water, and the canoe leaped forward. What were women made of? why, why must he be subjected to this?

The silence that followed was almost worse than the speech. Finally he stole a glance at his companion, and saw her face still faintly rosy—it must be mostly the light—and set in a sadness that had no touch of resentment in it.

"Perhaps you don't like my talking about it," she said, after awhile.

Geoffrey uttered an inarticulate murmur, but found no words.

"The aunties don't. Aunt Phoebe gets angry, and Aunt Vesta tearful and embarrassed. But—well, I could not stay at home. Everything there reminded me—I thought if I came here, where no such ideas ever entered, I might begin—not to forget, but to resign myself a little, after a time. But—I found you here. No, let me speak!" She raised her hand, as Geoffrey tried to interrupt.

"I have to make you understand—if I can—why I was rude and odious and ungrateful when I first came, for I was all those things, and I am not naturally so, I truly don't think I am. But, don't you see?— to come right upon some one who was having all that I had lost, enjoying all I had hoped to enjoy, and caring—well, perhaps as much as I cared, but still in a different way, a man's way, taking it all as a matter of course, where I would have taken it on my knees—"

"You must let me speak now, Miss Blyth," said Geoffrey Strong. He spoke loud and quickly, to drown the noise in his ears.

"I cannot let you—go on—under such a total misapprehension. I could not in a lifetime say how sorry I am for your cruel trouble. It makes me rage; I'd like to—never mind that now! but you are wholly mistaken in thinking that anything of the kind has ever come into my own life. I don't know how you received the impression, but you must believe me when I say I have never had any—any such affair, nor the shadow of one. It isn't my line. I not only never have had, but probably never shall have—" he was hurrying out word upon word, hoping to get it over and done with once and for ever. But letting his eyes drop for an instant to the girl's face, he saw on it a look of such unutterable amazement that he stopped short in his headlong speech.

They gazed at each other from alien worlds. At length—"Doctor Strong," said Vesta, and the words dropped slowly, one by one, "what do you mean?"

Geoffrey was silent. If she did not know what he meant, he certainly did not.

"What do you mean?" she repeated. "I do not understand one word of what you are saying."

Geoffrey tried hard to keep his temper. "You were speaking of your— disappointment," he said, stiffly. "You seemed to take it for granted that I—was engaged in some affair of a similar nature, and I felt bound to undeceive you. I have never been what is called in love in my life."

The bewilderment lingered in Vesta's eyes for an instant; then a light came into them. The sunset rushed in one crimson wave over face and neck and brow; she fell back on her pillows, quivering from head to foot. Was she going to cry again?

She was laughing! silently at first, trying hard to control herself; but now her laughter broke forth in spite of her, and peal after peal rang out, wild and sweet, helpless in its intensity.

Geoffrey sat paralysed a moment; then the professional instinct awoke. "Hysteria! another manifestation, that is all. I must stop it."

He leaned forward.

"Miss Blyth!"

"Ha, ha, ha!" laughed the girl. "Oh, dear, oh, dear! what shall I do? ha, ha, ha, ha! oh, what shall I do?"

"Stop!" said Geoffrey Strong. "Do you hear me? stop!"

"Oh, yes, I hear you—but—it is so funny! oh, it is so funny! ha, ha, ha! what shall I do?"

"What shall I do?" said Geoffrey to himself. "She'll have the canoe over in another minute." He crept toward the girl, and seized her wrists in a firm grip.

"Be still!" he said. "I shall hold you until you are quiet. Be—still! no more! be still!"

"You—hurt me!" whispered the girl. The wild laughter had died away, but she was still shaking, and the tears were running down her cheeks.

"I mean to hurt you. I shall hurt you more, if you are not quiet. As soon as you are quiet I will let you go. Be—still—still—there!"

He loosed her hands, and took up the paddle again. This kind of thing was very exhausting; he was quivering himself, quite perceptibly. Now why? nerves of sympathy?

He paddled on in silence; the sun went down, and the afterglow spread and brightened along the sky. He hardly thought of his companion, his whole mind bent on suppressing the turmoil that was going on in himself.

He started at the sound of her voice; it was faint, but perfectly controlled.

"Doctor Strong!"

"Miss Blyth!"

"You—thought—I had had a disappointment in love?"

"I did!"

"You are mistaken. You misunderstood my aunt, or me, or both. I have never, any more than you—"

Her voice grew stronger, and she sat upright.

"It was so very funny—no, I am not going off again—but I think there was some excuse for me this time. You certainly are having every opportunity of studying my case, Doctor Strong. The truth is— oh, I supposed it had been made clear to you; how could I suppose anything else? It was my career, my life, that I had to give up, not— not a man. You say you have never been what is called in love; Doctor Strong, no more have I!"

There was silence, and now it was in Geoffrey's face that the tide rose. Such a burning tide it was, he fancied he heard the blood hiss as it curled round the roots of his hair. He noted this as curious, and remembered that in hanging or drowning it was the trifles that stamped themselves upon the mind. Also, it appeared that he was hollow, with nothing but emptiness where should have been his vital parts.

"Shall I say anything?" he asked, presently. "There isn't anything to say, is there, except to beg your pardon? would you like to hear that I am a fool? But you know that already. Your aunt—things were said that were curiously misleading—not that that is any excuse—Do you want me to go into detail, or may I drown myself quietly?"

"Oh! don't," said Vesta, smiling. "I could not possibly paddle myself home, and I should infallibly upset the canoe in trying to rescue you."

"You would not try!" said Geoffrey, gloomily. "It would not be human if you tried."

"It would be professional," said Vesta. "Come, Doctor Strong, you see I can laugh about it, and you must laugh, too. Let us shake hands, and agree to forget all about it."

Geoffrey shook hands, and said she was very magnanimous; but he still felt hollow. The only further remark that his seething brain presented was a scrap of ancient doggerel:

"I wish I was dead, Or down at Owl's Head, Or anywhere else but here!"

This was manifestly inappropriate, so he kept silence, and paddled on doggedly.

"And aren't you going to ask what my disappointment really was?" inquired Vesta, presently. "But perhaps you have guessed?"

No, Geoffrey had not guessed.

"Don't you want to know? I should really—it would be a comfort to me to talk it over with you, if you don't mind."

Geoffrey would be delighted to hear anything that she chose to tell him.

"Yes, you seem delighted. Well—you see, you have not understood, not understood in the very least; and now in a moment you are going to know all about it." She paused for a moment, and there was an appeal in her clear, direct gaze; but Geoffrey did not want to be appealed to.

"I was at Johns Hopkins," said Vesta. "It was the beginning of my second year; I broke down, and had to give it up. I was studying medicine myself, Doctor Strong."

"Oh!" cried Geoffrey Strong.

The exclamation was a singular one; a long cry of amazement and reprobation. Every fibre of the man stiffened, and he sat rigid, a statue of Disapproval.

"I beg your pardon!" he said, after a moment. "I said it before, but I don't know that there is anything else to say. No doubt I was very stupid, yet I hardly know how I could have supposed just this to be the truth. I—no! I beg your pardon. That is all."

The girl looked keenly at him. "You are not sorry for me any more, are you?" she said.

Geoffrey was silent.

"You were sorry, very sorry!" she went on. "So long as you thought I had lost that precious possession, a lover; had lost the divine privilege of—what is the kind of thing they say? merging my life in another's, becoming the meek and gentle helpmeet of my God-given lord and master—you were very sorry. I could not make it out; it was so unlike what I expected from you. It was so human, so kind, so— yes, so womanlike. But the moment you find it is not a man, but only the aspiration of a lifetime, the same aspiration that in you is right and fitting and beautiful—you—you sit there like a—lamp-post— and disapprove of me."

"I am sorry!" said Geoffrey. He was trying hard to be reasonable, and said to himself that he would not be irritated, come what might. "I cannot approve of women studying medicine, but I am sorry for you, Miss Blyth."

Her face, which had been bitter enough in its set and scornful beauty, suddenly melted into a bewildering softness of light and laughter. She leaned forward. "But it was funny!" she said. "It was very, very funny, Doctor Strong, you must admit that. You were so compassionate, so kind, thinking me—"

"Do you think perhaps—but never mind! you certainly have the right to say whatever you choose," said Geoffrey, holding himself carefully.

"And all the time," she went on, "I utterly unconscious, and only fretting because I could not have my own life, my own will, my own way!"

"By Jove!" said Geoffrey, starting. "That—that's what I say myself!"

"Really!" said Vesta, dryly. "You see I also am human, after all"

"Do you see little Vesta anywhere, sister?" asked Miss Phoebe Blyth.

Miss Vesta had just lighted her lamp, and was standing with folded hands, in her usual peaceful attitude of content, gazing out upon the sunset sea. A black line lay out there on the rosy gold of the water; she had been watching it, watching the rhythmic flash of the paddle, and thinking happy, gentle thoughts, such as old ladies of tender heart often think. Miss Phoebe had no part in these thoughts, and Miss Vesta looked hurriedly round at the sound of her crisp utterance. Her breath fluttered a little, but she did not speak. Miss Phoebe came up behind her and peered out of the window. "I don't see where the child can be," she said, rather querulously. "I thought she was in the garden, but I don't—do you see her anywhere, Vesta?"

Miss Vesta had never read the "Pickwick Papers;" she considered Dickens vulgar; but her conduct at this moment resembled that of Samuel Weller on a certain noted occasion. Raising her eyes to the twilight sky, Miss Vesta said, gently, "No, Sister Phoebe, I do not!"



CHAPTER IX.

SIDE LIGHTS

ELMERTON, June 20, 1900.

DEAR JIM:—It is rather curious that you should have written me this particular letter at this particular time. 'Give me a man's coincidences and I'll give you his life!' Who is it says that?

You want my opinion about women's studying medicine; you personally have reason to think that the career of medicine is not incompatible with true womanliness, exquisite refinement, perfect grace and breeding. I really cannot copy your whole letter. The symptoms are, alas, only too familiar! You have met your Fate again (and those foolish old Greeks used to believe there were only three of 'em!) and she is a doctor, or is going to be one. Well—it's curious, as I said, for it happens that I have been thinking more or less about the same matter. I used to feel very strongly about it—hang it, I still feel very strongly about it! A girl doesn't know what she is doing when she goes into medicine. I grant that she does it, in many cases, from the highest possible motives. I grant that she is far ahead of most men in her ideas of the profession, and what it means, or ought to mean. But, all the same, she doesn't know what she is going in for, and I cannot conceive of a man's letting any woman he cares for go on with it. She must lose something; she must, I tell you; she cannot help it. And even if it isn't the essential things, still it changes her. She is less woman, less—whatever you choose to call it. A coarser touch has come upon her, and she is changed. Well, I say I believe all this, and I do, with all my soul; and yet, as you say, it's cruel hard for a young creature, all keyed up to a pitch of enthusiasm and devotion and noble aspiration, to be checked like a boy's kite, and brought down to the ground and told to mind her seam. It's cruel hard, I can see that; I can feel and sympathise intensely with all that part of it, and honour the purpose and the spirit, even though I cannot approve of the direction.

Oh, glancing at your letter again, I see that in your friend's case everything seems to be going on smoothly. Well, the principle remains the same. I suppose—I seem to have drifted away from your question, somehow—I suppose one woman in ten thousand may make a good physician. I suppose that this ten-thousandth woman—a woman who is all that you say—may be justified, perhaps, in becoming a physician; whether a woman physician can remain all that you say—ah! that is the question! Man alive, am I Phoebus Apollo, that I should know the answers to all the questions? I wish I could find the way to Delphi myself.

But don't get the idea that you bore me with your confidences, old man. Did I say so? on the contrary, tell me all you can; it interests me extremely. I am thinking about these matters—pathologically—a good deal. A physician has to, of course. Tell me how you feel, how it takes you. Do you find it gets into your breathing sometimes, like rarefied air? Curious sensation, rarefied air—I remember it on Mont Blanc.

What am I doing? Man, I am practising medicine! Cases at present, one typhoid, two tonsilitis, five measles, eight dyspepsia, six rheumatism, et id gen om., one cantankerousness (she calls it depression), one gluttony, one nerves. Pretty busy, but my wheel keeps me in good trim. I have been paddling more or less, too, to keep chest and arms up with the rest of the procession.

The old ladies are as dear as ever; if I am not wholly spoilt, it will not be their fault, bless their kind hearts! The niece is better, I think.

Good-bye, old man! write again soon, and tell me more about Amaryllis. How pretty the classical names are: Chloe, Lalage, Diana, Vesta. I was brought up on Fannies and Minnies and Lotties, with Eliza for a change. Horrible name, Eliza!

GEOFF.

The young doctor had just posted the above letter, and was sauntering along the street on his way home. It lacked an hour of tea-time, and he was wondering which of several things he should do. There was hardly time for a paddle; besides, Vesta Blyth had gone for a drive with the minister's daughter. Geoffrey did not think driving half as good for her as being on the water. He must contrive to get through his afternoon calls earlier to-morrow. He might stop and see how Tommy Candy was,—no! there was Tommy, sitting by the roadside, pouring sand over his head from a tin cup. He was all right, then; the young doctor thought he would be if they stopped dosing him, and fed him like a Christian for a day or two. Well,—there was no one else who could not wait till morning. Why should he not go and call on Mrs. Tree? here he was at the house. It was the hour when in cities the sophisticated clustered about five o'clock tea-tables, and tested the comfort of various chairs, and indulged in talk as thin as the china and bread and butter. Five o'clock tea was unknown in Elmerton, but Mrs. Tree would be glad to see him, and he always enjoyed a crack with her.

He turned in at the neat gate. The house stood well back from the street, in the trimmest and primmest little garden that ever was seen. Most of the shrubs were as old as their owner, and had something of her wrinkled sprightliness; and the annuals felt their responsibilities, and tried to live up to the York and Lancaster rose and the strawberry bush.

The door was opened by a Brownie, disguised in a cap and apron. This was Direxia Hawkes, aunt to Diploma Grotty. In his mind Geoffrey had christened the little house the Aunt's Nest, but he never dared to tell anybody this.

"Well, Direxia, how is Mrs. Tree to-day? would she like to see me, do you think?"

"She ain't no need to see you!"

The young doctor looked grieved, and turned away.

"But I expect she'd be pleased to. Step in!"

This was Direxia's one joke, and she never tired of it; no more did Geoffrey. He entered the cool dim parlour, which smelt of red cedar; the walls were panelled with it. The floor was of polished oak, dark with age; the chairs and tables were of rare foreign woods, satin and leopard wood, violet-wood and ebony. The late Captain Tree had been a man of fancy, and, sailing on many seas, never forgot his name, but bought precious woods wherever he found them.

"Here's the doctor!" said Direxia. "I expect he'll keep right on coming till he finds you sick."

"That's what he will do!" said Geoffrey. "No chance for me to-day, though, I see. How do you do, Mrs. Tree? I think it is hardly respectable for you to look so well. Can't you give me one little symptom? not a tiny crick in your back? you ought to have one, sitting in that chair."

Mrs. Tree was sitting bolt upright in an ancient straight-backed chair of curious workmanship. It was too high for her, so her little feet, of which she was inordinately vain, rested on a hassock of crimson tapestry. She wore white silk stockings, and slippers of cinnamon-coloured satin to match her gown. A raffled black silk apron, a net kerchief pinned with a quaint diamond brooch, and a cap suggesting the Corinthian Order, completed her costume. Her face was netted close with fine wrinkles, but there was no sign of age in her bright dark eyes.

"Never you trouble yourself about my cheer!" said the old lady with some severity. "Sit down in one yourself—there are plenty of lolloping ones if your back's weak—and tell me what mischief you have been up to lately. I wouldn't trust you round the corner."

"You'll break my heart some day," said Geoffrey, with a heavy sigh; "and then you will be sorry, Mrs. Tree. Mischief? Let me see! I set Jim Arthur's collar-bone this morning; do you care about Jim Arthur? he fell off his bicycle against a stone wall."

"Serve him right, too!" said Mrs. Tree. "Riding that nasty thing, running folks down and scaring their horses. I'd put 'em all in the bonfire-pile if I was Town Council. Your turn will come some day, young man, for all you go spinning along like a spool of cotton. How's the girls?"

She rang the bell, and Direxia appeared.

"Bring the cake and sherry!" she said. "It's a shame to spoil boys, but when they're spoilt already, there's less harm done. How's the girls?"

Geoffrey reported a clean bill of health, so far as Miss Phoebe and Miss Vesta were concerned. "I really am proud of Miss Phoebe!" he said. "She says she feels ten years younger than she did three months ago, and I think it's true."

"Phoebe has no call to feel ten years younger!" said Mrs. Tree, shortly. "She's a very suitable age as it is. I don't like to see a cat play kitten, any more than I like to see a kitten play cat. How's the child?"

"I should like to see Miss Phoebe playing kitten!" said Geoffrey, his eyes dancing. "It would be something to remember. What child, Mrs. Tree?"

"The little girl; little Vesta. Is she coming out of her tantrums, think?"

"She—is a great deal better, certainly," said Geoffrey. "I hope—I feel sure that she will recover entirely in time. But you must not call her trouble tantrums, Mrs. Tree, really. Neurasthenia is a recognised form of—"

"You must have looked quite pretty when you was short-coated!" said the old lady, irrelevantly. "Have some wine? the cake is too rich for you, but you may have just a crumb."

"You must have been the wickedest thing alive when you were eighteen!" said Geoffrey, pouring out the amber sherry into a wonderful gilt glass. "I wish Direxia would stay in the room and matronise me; I'm afraid, I tell you."

"If Direxia had nothing better to do, I'd send her packing," said Mrs. Tree. "Here!"

They touched glasses solemnly.

"Wishing you luck in a wife!" said the old lady.

"Good gracious!" cried Geoffrey.

"It's what you need, young man, and you'd better be looking out for one. There must be some one would have you, and any wife is better than none."

She looked up, though not at Geoffrey, and a twinkle came into her eyes. "Do you call little Vesta pretty, now?" she asked.

"Not pretty," said Geoffrey; "that is not the word. I—"

"Then you'd better not call her anything," said Mrs. Tree, "for she's in the door behind ye."

Geoffrey started violently, and turned around. Vesta was standing framed in the dark doorway. The clear whiteness of her beauty had never seemed more wonderful. The faint rose in her cheeks only made the white more radiant; her eyes were no longer agate-like, but soft and full of light; only her smile remained the same, shadowy, elusive, a smile in a dream.

When the young doctor remembered his manners and rose to his feet— after all, it was only a moment or two—he saw that Miss Vesta was standing behind her niece, a little gray figure melting into the gloom of the twilight hall. The two now entered the room together.

"Aunt Vesta wanted you to see my new hat, Aunt Tree," said the girl. "Do you like it?"

"Yes!" said Miss Vesta, coming forward timidly. "Good evening, Aunt Marcia. Oh, good evening to you, Doctor Strong. The hat seemed to me so pretty, and you are always so kindly interested, Aunt Marcia! I ought to apologise to you, Doctor Strong, for introducing such a subject."

"Vesta, don't twitter!" said Mrs. Tree. "Is there anything improper about the hat? It's very well, child, very well. I always liked a scoop myself, but folks don't know much nowadays. What do you think of it, young man?"

Geoffrey thought it looked like a lunar halo, but he did not say so; he said something prim and conventional about its being very pretty and becoming.

"Are you going to sit down?" asked Mrs. Tree. "I can't abide to see folks standing round as if they was hat-poles."

Miss Vesta slipped into a seat, but the younger Vesta shook her head.

"I must go on!" she said. "Aunt Phoebe is expecting a letter, and I must tell her that there is none."

"Yes, dear, yes!" said Miss Vesta. "Your Aunt Phoebe will be impatient, doubtless; you are right. And perhaps it will be best for me, too—" she half rose, but Mrs. Tree pulled her down again without ceremony.

"You stay here, Vesta!" she commanded. "I want to see you. But you"— she turned to Geoffrey, who had remained standing—"can go along with the child, if you're a mind to. You'll get nothing more out of me, I tell ye."

"I am going to send you a measles bacillus to-morrow morning," said the young doctor. "You must take it in your coffee, and then you will want to see me every day. Good-bye, Mrs. Tree! some day you will be sorry for your cruelty. Miss Vesta—till tea-time!"

Aunt and niece watched the young couple in silence as they walked along the street. Both walked well; it was a pleasure to see them move. He was tall enough to justify the little courteous bend of the head, but not enough to make her anxious about the top of her hat— if she ever had such anxieties.

"Well!" said Mrs. Tree, suddenly.

Miss Vesta started. "Yes, dear Aunt Marcia!" she said. "Yes, certainly; I am here."

"They make a pretty couple, don't they?" said the old lady. "If she would come out of her tantrums,—hey, Vesta?"

"Oh, Aunt Marcia!" said Miss Vesta, softly. She blushed very pink, and looked round the room with a furtive, frightened glance.

"No, there's no one behind the sofa," said Mrs. Tree; "and there's no one under the big chair, and Phoebe is safe at home with her knitting, and the best place for her." (Mrs. Tree did not "get on" with her niece Phoebe.) "There's no use in looking like a scared pigeon, Vesta Blyth. I say they make a pretty couple, and I say they would make a pretty couple coming out of church together. I'd give her my Mechelin flounces; you'll never want 'em."

"Oh, Aunt Marcia!" said dear Miss Vesta, clasping her soft hands. "If it might be the Lord's will—"

"The Lord likes to be helped along once in a while!" said Mrs. Tree. "Don't tell me! I wasn't born yesterday." And this statement was not to be controverted.



CHAPTER X.

OVER THE WAY

"Deacon," said Mrs. Weight, "Mis' Tree is sick!"

"Now, reelly!" said the deacon. "Is that so?"

"It is so. She sent for Doctor Strong this morning. I saw Direxia go out, and she was gone just the len'th of time to go to the girls' and back. Pretty soon he came, riding like mad on that wheel thing of his. He stayed 'most an hour, and came out with a face a yard long. I expect it's her last sickness, don't you?"

"Mebbe so!" said the deacon, dubiously. "Mis' Tree has had a long life; she'd oughter be prepared; I trust she is. She has always loved the world's things, but I trust she is. Ain't this ruther a slim dinner, Viny? I was looking for a boiled dinner to-day, kind of."

"Fried apples and pork was good enough for my father," replied his wife, "and I guess they'll do for you, Ephraim Weight. Doctor Strong says you eat too much every day of your life, and that's why you run to flesh so. Not that I think much of what he says. I asked him how he accounted for me being so fleshy, and not the value of a great spoonful passing my lips some days; he made answer he couldn't say. I think less of that young man's knowledge every time I see him. 'Pears to me if I was the Blyth girls, I should be real unwilling to have my aunt pass away with no better care than she's likely to get from him. Billy, where's your push-piece? I don't want to see you push with your fingers again. It's real vulgar."

"I've eat it!" said Billy. "Mother, there's the young lady from Miss Blythses going in to Mis' Tree's."

"I want to know—so she is! She's got a bag with her. She's going to stay. Well, I expect that settles it. I should think Phoebe and Vesta would feel kind o' bad, being passed over in that way, but it's pleasant to have young folks about a dying bed—Annie Lizzie, I'll slap you if you don't stop kicking under the table—and Nathaniel was always his aunt's favourite. Most likely she's left her property to him, or to this girl. I expect it'll be a handsome provision. Mis' Tree has lived handsome and close all her days. As you say, deacon, I hope she's prepared, but I never see any signs of active piety in her myself."

There was a pause, while all the family—except Annie Lizzie, who profited by the interlude to take two doughnuts beyond her usual allowance—gazed eagerly at the house opposite.

"She's questioning Direxia. She's shaking her head. Mebbe it's all over by now; I expect it is. I declare, there's a kind of solemn look comes over a house—you can't name it, but it's there. Deacon, I think you'd ought to step over. Elder Haskell is away, you know, and you senior deacon; I do certainly think you'd ought to step over and offer prayer, or do whatever's needful. They'll want you to break it to the girls, like as not; it's terrible to have no man in a family. All them lone women, and everything to see to; I declare, my heart warms to 'em, if Phoebe is cranky. Ain't you going, Deacon?"

The deacon hesitated. "I—ain't sure that I'd better, Viny!" he said. "I feel no assurance that Mis' Tree has passed away, and she is not one that welcomes inquiry as a rule. I've no objection to asking at the door—"

"Now, Deacon, if that isn't you all over! you are always so afraid of putting yourself forward. Where would you have been this day, I should like to know, if it hadn't been for me shoving behind? I tell you, when folks comes to their last end they suffer a great change. If you let that woman die—though it's my firm belief she's dead a'ready—without at least trying to bring her state before her, you'll have to answer for it; I won't be responsible. Here's your hat; now you go right over. There's no knowing—"

"There's Doctor Strong going in now!" pleaded the deacon. "Most likely he will see to—"

"Ephraim Weight! look me in the eye! We've lived opposite neighbours to Mis' Tree twenty years, and do you think I'm going to have it said that when her time came to die we stood back and let strangers, and next door to heathen, do for her? If you don't go over. I shall. Mebbe I'd better go, anyway. Wait till I get my bunnit—"

It ended with the deacon's going alone. Slowly and unwillingly he plodded across the street, and shuffled up the walk; timidly and half-heartedly he lifted the shining knocker and let it fall. Direxia Hawkes opened the door, and he passed in.

* * * * *

"Well?" said Mrs. Weight.

The deacon had not made a long stay at the opposite house. Returning faster than he came, his large white cheeks were slightly flushed; his pale blue eyes wore a startled look. He suffered his wife to take his hat and stick from him, and opened his mouth once or twice, but said nothing.

"Well?" said Mrs. Weight again. "Is she dead, Deacon? Ephraim, what has happened to you? have you lost the use of your speech? Oh! what will become of me, with these four innocent—"

"Woman, be still!" said Ephraim Weight; and his wife was still, gaping in utter bewilderment at this turning of her mammoth but patient worm.

"Mrs. Tree is not dead!" resumed the deacon. "I don't see as she's any more likely to die than I am. I don't see as there's any living thing the matter with her—except the devil!"

At this second outburst Mrs. Weight collapsed, and sat down, her hands on her knees, staring at her husband. The children whimpered and crept behind her ample back. "Pa" was transformed.

"I went to that house," Deacon Weight went on, "against my judgment, Viny; you know I did. I felt no call to go, quite the reverse, but you were so—

"I found Mis' Tree sitting up straight in her chair in the parlour. She had her nightcap on, and her feet in a footmuff, but that was all the sign of sickness I could see. She looked up at me as wicked as ever I saw her. 'Here's the deacon,' she says! 'he's heard I'm sick—Viny saw you come, doctor,—and he has come to pray over me. I'm past praying for, Deacon. Have some orange cordial!'

"There was glasses on the tray, and a decanter of that cordial Direxia makes; it's too strong for a temperance household. Doctor Strong and that young Blyth girl were sitting on two stools, and they was all three playing cards! I suppose I looked none too well pleased, for Mis' Tree said, 'I can't have you turning my cordial sour, Ephraim Weight. Remember when you stole oranges out of the schooner, and Cap'n Tree horsed you up and spanked you? here's your health, Ephraim!'

"She—she looked at me for a minute, sharp and quick—I was seeking for some word that might bring her to a sense of her state, and what was fitting at her age—and then she begun to laugh. 'You thought I was dead!' says she. 'You thought I was dead, I see it in your face; and Viny sent you to view the remains. You go home, and tell her I'll bury ye both, and do it handsome. Go 'long with ye! scat!'

"That was the expression she used, to a senior deacon of the congregation she sits in. I believe Satan has a strong hold on that old woman. I—I think I will go to my room, wife."

* * * * *

"Do you think there is really anything the matter with Aunt Tree?" asked Vesta. She had followed the young doctor out into the prim little garden, and was picking some late roses as she spoke.

"I can't make out anything," said Geoffrey. "She says she has a pain, and tells me to find out where it is, if I know anything; and then she laughs in my face, and refuses to answer questions. I think Mr. Tree must have had a lively time of it; she's perfectly delightful, though. Her pulse and temperature are all right; she looks well; of course at that age the slightest breath blows out the flame, but I cannot make out that anything is actually wrong. I suspect—"

"What?" said Vesta.

"I suspect she simply wanted you to come and stay with her, and made this an excuse."

"But I would have come; there was no need of any excuse. I would have come in a minute if she had asked me; I am so very much stronger, and I love to stay here."

"You won't stay long, though, will you? it can't be necessary, not in the least necessary. She is really perfectly well, and we—your aunts, that is—the house will be too forlorn without you."

Vesta laughed; she had a delightful laugh.

"You have charming manners!" she said. "I can't help knowing that you will really be glad to be rid of me, all but Aunt Vesta; dear Aunt Vesta."

"You don't know!" said Geoffrey. "It won't be the same place without you."

"Yes, I do know; Aunt Phoebe told me. You said the three of you made the perfect triangle, and you wouldn't let in the Czar of Russia or the Pope of Rome to spoil it."

"Oh! but that was before—that was when things were entirely different!" said Geoffrey. "I—to tell the truth, I think I was about twelve years old when I first came to the house. I am growing up a little, Miss Blyth, I truly am. And you are not in the least like the Czar or the Pope either, and—I wish you would come back. Mayn't I have a rose, please?"

"Oh! all you want, I am sure," said Vesta, heartily. "But they are not really so pretty as those at home."

"I thought perhaps you would give me one of those in your hand," said Geoffrey, half-timidly. "Thank you! I don't suppose—"

He was about to suggest her pinning it on his coat, but caught sight of Mrs. Weight at the opposite window, and refrained.

"Do you know any Spanish?" he asked, abruptly.

"Spanish? no!" said Vesta, looking at him wide-eyed.

"Not even names of flowers?"

"No! how should I? Why do you ask?"

"Oh—nothing! I was thinking of learning it one of these days, but I don't believe I shall. Come and walk a little way, won't you? You look tired. I can't—you must not stay here if you are going to get tired, you know. Old people are very exacting sometimes."

"Oh, I shall not get tired. You can't think how much better I am. No, I must go back now, Doctor Strong. Aunt Tree might want something."

"Physician's orders!" said Geoffrey, peremptorily. "Dose of one-half mile, to be taken immediately. Won't you please come, Miss Blyth? I—I want to tell you about a very interesting case."

Mrs. Weight peered over the window-blind. She was carrying a cup of tea to the deacon, who was feeling poorly, but had paused at sight of the young couple. "If that girl thinks of making up to that young man," she said, "she's got hold of the wrong cob, I can tell her. Mira Pettis made him a napkin-holder, worked 'Bonappety' on it in cross-stitch on blue satin, and he give it to the girls' cat for a collar. I see the cat with it on. I don't want to see no clearer than that how he treats young ladies. I wish't Doctor Stedman was home."



CHAPTER XI.

BROKEN BONES

Another bicycle accident! This time it was a head-on collision, two boys riding at each other round a corner, as if for a wager. The young doctor had patched them both up, there being no broken bones, only a dislocated shoulder and many bruises, and was now riding home, reflecting upon the carelessness of the human race in general, and of boys in particular. Here was one of the great benefactions of modern civilisation, a health-and-pleasure-giving apparatus within the reach of all, and often turned into an engine of destruction by senseless stupidity. Mrs. Tree would burn all bicycles if she could have her way; not that Mrs. Tree was stupid, far from it! Miss Phoebe disapproved of them, Miss Vesta feared them, and evidently expected his to blow up from day to day. What would they all say if they knew that he had been trying to persuade Vesta to ride with him? He called her Vesta in his thoughts, merely to distinguish her from her aunt. He was quite sure it would be the best possible exercise for her, now that she was so much stronger. So far, she had met all his representations with her gentle—no! not gentle; Geoffrey would be switched if she was gentle; her quiet negative. Her aunts would not like it, and there was an end. Well, there wasn't an end! A reasonable person ought to listen to reason, and be convinced by it. Vesta did not appear to be reasonable yet, but she was intelligent, and the rest would come as she grew stronger. And—he had no right to say she was not gentle; she could be the gentlest creature that ever lived, when it was a question of a child, or a bird, or— anything that was hurt, in short. When that little beggar fell down the other day and barked his idiotic little shins, the way she took him up, and kissed him, and got him to laughing, while he, Geoffrey, plastered him up; and it hurt too, getting the gravel out. When that violoncello note gets into her voice—well, you know! Yes, she must certainly ride the bicycle! What could be more restoring, more delightful, than to ride along a country road like this, in the soft afternoon, when the heat of the day was over? The honey-clover was in blossom; there were clusters of it everywhere, making the whole air sweet. Of course he would watch her, keep note of her colour and breathing, see that she did not overdo it. Of course it was his business to see to all that. What was that the old professor used to say?

"There are two hands upon the pulse of life; the detective's, to surprise and confound, the physician's, to help and to heal."

It was that, after all, that feeling, that decided one to be a physician. If he could do anything to help this beautiful and—yes, noble creature, he was bound to do it, wasn't he, whether her aunts liked it or not? even, perhaps, whether she herself liked it or not. Well, but she would like it, she couldn't help liking it, once she tried it. She was built for a rider. He might borrow Miss Flabb's wheel for her. It was absurd for Miss Flabb to attempt to ride; she would never do enough to take down her flesh, and meantime, being near-sighted, she was at the mercy of every stray dog and hen, and likely to be run down by the first scorcher on the highroad. Now with him, even at the beginning, Vesta would have nothing to fear. He would—

At this moment came an interruption. The interruption had four legs, and barked. It came from a neighbouring farmhouse, and flew straight at the wheel, which was also flying, for the young doctor was apt to ride fast when he was thinking. There was a whirl of arms, legs, wheels, and tails, a heavy fall,—and the dog ran off on three legs, ki-hying to the skies, and the young doctor lay still in the road.

Half an hour later, Mr. Ithuriel Butters stopped at the door of the Temple of Vesta. He was driving a pair of comfortable old white horses, who went to sleep as soon as he said "Whoa!" He looked up at the house, and then behind him in the wagon. Seeing nobody at the windows, he looked up and down the street, and was aware of a young woman approaching. He hailed her.

"Say, do you know the folks in that house?"

"Yes," said Vesta; "I am staying there."

"Be!" said Mr. Butters. "Wal, Doctor Strong boards there too, don't he?"

"Yes; I don't think he is in now, though."

"I know he ain't!" said Ithuriel Butters.

Vesta looked with interest at the stalwart old figure, and strong keen face. Most of the wrinkles in the face had come from smiling, but it was grave enough now.

"Will you come in and wait," she asked, "or leave a message?"

"Wal, I guess I won't do neither—this time!" said Mr. Butters, slowly.

Vesta looked at him in some perplexity; he returned a glance of grave meaning.

"You kin to him?" asked the old man. "Sister, or cousin, mebbe?"

"No! what is it? something has happened to Doctor Strong!" Vesta's hand tightened on the rail of the steps.

"Keepin' company with him, p'raps?"

"No, oh, no! will you tell me at once, please, and plainly, what has happened?"

Vesta spoke quietly; in her normal condition she was always quieter when moved; but the colour seemed to fall from her cheeks as her eyes followed those of the old man to something that lay long and still in the cart behind him.

"Fact is," said Mr. Butters, "I've got him here. 'Pears to be"—the strong old voice faltered for an instant—"'pears to be bust up some consid'able. I found him in the ro'd a piece back, with his velocipede tied up all over him. He ain't dead, nor he ain't asleep, but I can't git nothin' out of him, so I jest brung him along. I'll h'ist him out, if you say so."

"Can you?" said Vesta. "I will help you. I am strong enough. Will your horses stand?"

"They can't fall down, 'count of the shafts," said Mr. Butters, clambering slowly down from his seat, "and they won't do nothin' else. We'll git him out now, jest as easy. I think a sight of that young feller; made me feel bad, I tell ye, to see him there all stove up, and think mebbe—"

"Don't, please!" said Vesta. "I am—not very strong—"

"Thought you said you was!" said Ithuriel Butters. "You stand one side, then, if it's the same to you. I can carry him as easy as I would a baby, and I wouldn't hurt him no more'n I would one."

* * * * *

"There are two hands upon the pulse of life!" said the young doctor.

No one replied to this remark, nor did he appear to expect a reply. The room was darkened, and he was lying on his bed; at least some one was, he supposed it was himself. There was a smell of drugs. Some one had been hurt.

"There are two hands upon the pulse of life," he repeated; "the detective's, to surprise—and confound; the phys—phys—what?"

"Physician's," said some one.

"That's it! the physician's, to help and to heal. This appears to be— combination—both—"

The hand was removed from his wrist. He frowned heavily, and asked if he were a Mohammedan. Receiving no answer, repeated the question with some irritation.

"I don't think so," said the same quiet voice. "Then why—turban?" he frowned again, and brought the folds of linen lower over his nose. They were quietly readjusted. The light, firm hand was laid on his forehead for a moment, then once more on his wrist. Then something was put to his lips; he was told to drink, and did so. Than he said, "My name is Geoffrey Strong. There is nothing the matter with me."

"Yes, I know."

"But—if you take away your hand—I can't hold on, you know."

The hand was laid firmly on his. He sighed comfortably, murmuring something about not knowing that violoncellos had hands; dozed a few minutes; dragged himself up from unimaginable depths to ask, "You are sure you understand that about the pulse?"

Being answered, "Yes, I quite understand," said, "Then you'll see to it!" and slept like a baby.

When he woke next morning, it was with an alert and inquisitive eye. The eye glanced here and there, taking in details.

"What the—what is all this?"

There was a soft flurry, and Miss Vesta was beside him. "Oh! my dear— my dear young friend! thank God, you are yourself again!"

Geoffrey's eyes softened into tenderness as he looked at her. "Dear Miss Vesta! what is the matter? I seem to have—" He tried to move his right arm, but stopped with a grimace. "I seem to have smashed myself. Would it bother you to tell me about it? Stop, though! I remember! a dog ran out, and got tangled up in the spokes. Oh, yes, I remember. Am I much damaged? arm broken—who set it? that's a nice bandage, anyhow. But why the malignant and the turbaned Turk effect? is my head broken, too?"

"Oh, no, dear Doctor Strong, nothing malignant; nothing at all of that nature, I assure you. Oh, I hope, I hope the arm is properly cared for! but it was so unfortunate his being laid up with pleurisy just at this time, wasn't it? and a severe contusion on your head, you see, so that for some hours we were sadly—but now you are entirely yourself, and we are so humbly and devoutly thankful, dear Doctor Strong!"

"I think you might say 'Geoffrey,' when I am all broke up!" said the boy.

"Geoffrey, dear Geoffrey!" murmured Miss Vesta, patting his sound arm softly.

"I think you might sit down by me and tell me all about it. Who is laid up with pleurisy? how much am I broken? who brought me home? who set my arm? I want to know all about it, please!"

The young doctor spoke with cheerful imperiousness. Miss Vesta glanced timorously toward the door, then sat down by the bedside. "Hush!" she said, softly. "You must not excite yourself, my dear young friend, you must not, indeed. I will tell you all about it, if you think—if you are quite sure you ought to be told. You are a physician, of course, but she was very anxious that you should not be excited."

"Who was anxious? I shall be very much excited if you keep things from me, Miss Vesta. I feel my temperature going up this moment."

"Dear! dear!" cried poor Miss Vesta. "Try—to—to restrain it, Geoffrey, I implore you. I will—I will tell you at once. As you surmise, my dear, a dog—we suppose it to have been a dog, though I am not aware that anyone saw the accident. An old man whom you once attended—Mr. Butters; you spoke of him, I remember—found you lying in the road, my child, quite unconscious. He is an unpolished person, but possessed of warm affections. I—I can never forget his tender solicitude about you. He brought you home in his wagon, and carried you into the house. He volunteered to go to Greening for Doctor Namby—"

"Namby never put on this bandage!" interrupted Geoffrey.

"No, Geoffrey, no! we do not think highly of Doctor Namby, but there was no one else, for you seem to feel so strongly about Doctor Pottle—"

"Pottle is a boiled cabbage-head!" said Geoffrey. "He couldn't set a hen's leg without tying it in bow-knots, let alone a man's arm. Who did set it, Miss Vesta? I'm sure I must be up to 105 by this time. I can't answer for the consequences, you know, if—"

"Oh! hush! hush!" cried Miss Vesta. "He had the pleurisy, as I said; very badly indeed, poor man, so that he was quite, quite invalided—"

"Pottle had? serve him—"

"No, no, Geoffrey; Doctor Namby had. And so—she was quite positive she understood the case, and—Mr. Butters upheld her—oh, I trust, I trust I did not do wrong in allowing her to take so grave a responsibility—Sister Phoebe in bed with her erysipelas—Geoffrey— you will not be angry, my dear young friend? Little Vesta set the arm!"

The word finally spoken, Miss Vesta sat panting quickly and softly, like a frightened bird, her eyes fixed anxiously on the young doctor.

The young doctor whistled; then considered the arm again with keen scrutiny.

"The de—that is—she did, did she?" he said, half to himself. He felt it all over with his sound hand, and inspected it again. "Well, it's a mighty good job," he said, "whoever did it."

Miss Vesta's sigh of relief was almost a gasp. Geoffrey looked up quickly, and saw her gentle eyes brimming with tears.

"You dear angel!" he cried, taking her hand. "I have made you anxious. I am a brute—a cuttlefish—hang me, somebody, do!"

"Oh! hush, hush! my boy!" cried the little lady, wiping away her tears. "It was only—the relief, Geoffrey. To feel that you are not angry at her—Sister Phoebe would call it presumption, but Vesta did not mean to be presumptuous, Geoffrey—and that you think it is not so ill done as I feared. I—I am so happy, that is all, my dear!"

She wept silently, and Geoffrey lay and called himself names. Presently—"Where is she?" he asked.

"Sister Phoebe? she is still in bed, and suffering a good deal. I am continuing the remedies you gave her. I—I have thought it best to let her suppose that Doctor Namby had attended you, Geoffrey. She is very nervous, and I feared to excite her."

Geoffrey commended her wisdom, but made it clear that he was not thinking of Miss Phoebe. Couldn't he see Miss Little Vesta? he asked. He wanted to—to thank her for what she had done, and ask just how she had done it. There were all sorts of details—in short, it was important that he should see her at once. Asleep? Why—it seemed unreasonable that she should be asleep at this hour of the morning. Was she not well?

"She—she watched by you most of the night!" Miss Vesta confessed. "Your head—she was afraid of congestion, and wanted the cloths changed frequently. She would not let me sit up, Geoffrey, though I begged her to let me do so. She will come as soon as she wakes, I am sure."

"I told you I was a cuttlefish!" said Geoffrey. "Now you see! I—I believe I am getting sleepy again, Miss Vesta. What is that pretty thing you have around your neck? Did she sit in that chair? What a fool a man is when he is asleep!"

Seeing his eyelids droop, Miss Vesta moved softly away; was called back at the door, and found him looking injured. "You haven't tucked me up!" he said.

Miss Vesta tucked him up with delicate precision, and drew the snowy counterpane into absolute smoothness. "There!" she said, her gentle eyes beaming with maternal pleasure. "Is there anything else, dear doctor—I mean dear Geoffrey?"

"No, nothing—unless—I don't suppose angels ever kiss people, do they?"

Very pink indeed, even to her pretty little ears, Miss Vesta stooped and deposited a very small and very timid kiss on his forehead; then slipped away like a little shocked ghost, wondering what Sister Phoebe would say.



CHAPTER XII.

CONVALESCENCE

"Where did you get your splints?" asked Geoffrey. "Was this thing all arranged beforehand? you confess to the bandages in your trunk."

Vesta laughed. "Your poor cigars! I tumbled them out of their box with very little ceremony. See them, scattered all over the table! I must put them tidy."

She moved to the table, and began piling the cigars in a hollow square. "A cigar-box makes excellent splints," she said; "did you ever try it?"

But Geoffrey was thinking what a singular amount of light a white dress seemed to bring into a room, and did not immediately reply.

When he did speak, he said, "You watched me—I kept you up all night. I ought to be shot."

"That would be twice as troublesome," said Vesta, gravely; "I can set an arm, but I don't know anything about wounds, except theoretically. Perhaps you would'nt like theoretic treatment."

"Perhaps not. Was there—it seems a perfectly absurd question to ask, but—well, was any one playing the 'cello here last night? why do you laugh?"

"Only because you seem to have the 'cello so on your mind. You said such funny things last night, while you were light-headed, you know."

Geoffrey became conscious of the roots of his hair. "What did I say?" he asked.

"You seemed to think that some one was playing the 'cello; or rather, you fancied there was a 'cello in the room, and it seemed to be endowed with life. You said, 'I didn't know that 'cellos had hands!' and then you asked if it spoke Spanish. I couldn't help laughing a little at that, and you were quite short with me, and told me I that didn't know phlox from flaxseed. It was very curious!"

"Must have been!" said Geoffrey, dryly. "I'm only thankful—was that the worst thing I said?"

"Wasn't that bad enough? yes, that was the very worst. I am going out now, Doctor Strong. Is there anything I can do for you?"

"Going out!" repeated Geoffrey, in dismay.

"Yes. I have some errands to do. What is it?" for the cloud on his brow was unmistakable.

"Oh—nothing! I thought you were going to see to this crack in my skull, but it's no matter."

"It is hardly two hours since I dressed it," said Vesta. "I thought you said it felt very comfortable."

"Well—it did; but it hurts now, considerably. No matter, though, if you are busy I dare say I could get Pottle to come in sometime in the course of the day."

He had the grace to be ashamed of himself, when Vesta brought basin and sponge, and began quietly and patiently to dress the injured temple.

"I know I am fractious," he said, plaintively. "I can't seem to help it."

He looked up, and saw her clear eyes intent and full of light.

"It is healing beautifully!" she said. "I wish you could see it; it's a lovely colour now."

"It's a shame to give you all this trouble," said Geoffrey, trying to feel real contrition.

"Oh, but I like it!" he was cheerfully assured. "It's delightful to see a cut like this."

"Thank you!" said Geoffrey. "I used to feel that way myself."

"And the callous is going to form quickly in the arm, I am sure of it!" said Vesta, with shining eyes. "I am so pleased with you, Doctor Strong! And now—there! is that all right? Take the glass and see if you like the looks of it. I think the turban effect is rather becoming. Now—is there any one you would like me to go and see while I am out? Of course—I have no diploma, nothing of the sort, but I could carry out your orders faithfully, and report to you."

"Oh, you are very good!" said Geoffrey. "But—you would be gone all the—I mean—your aunts might need you, don't you think?"

"No, indeed! Aunt Phoebe is better—I gave her the drops, and Aunt Vesta is bathing her now with the lotion—I can take the afternoon perfectly well. Your case-book? this one? no, truly, Doctor Strong, it will be a pleasure, a real pleasure."

"You're awfully good!" said Geoffrey, ruefully.

"It is the most unfortunate combination I ever heard of!" said Miss Phoebe Blyth.

Miss Phoebe was in bed, too, and suffering very considerable discomfort. Erysipelas is not a thing to speak lightly of; and if it got into Miss Phoebe's temper as well as into her eyes, this was not to be wondered at.

Miss Vesta murmured some soothing words, and bathed the angry red places gently; but Miss Phoebe was not to be soothed.

"It is all very well for you, Vesta," said the poor lady, "you have never had any responsibility; of course it is not to be supposed that you should have, with what you have gone through. But with all I have on my shoulders, to be laid up in this way is—really, I must say!"

This last remark was the sternest censure that Miss Phoebe was ever known to bestow upon the Orderings of Providence.

"Has Doctor Pottle attended to the doctor's arm this morning?"

This was the question Miss Vesta had been dreading. She pretended not to hear it; but it was repeated with incisive severity.

"You are getting a little hard of hearing, Vesta. I asked you, has Doctor Strong's arm been attended to this morning?"

"Yes! oh, yes, Sister Phoebe, it has. And—it is healing finely, and so is his head. She says—I mean—"

"You mean he says!" said Miss Phoebe, with a superior air. "This excitement is too much for you, Vesta. We shall have you breaking down next. I do not know that I care to hear precisely what Doctor Pottle says. In such an emergency as this we were forced to call him in, but I have a poor opinion of his skill, and none of his intelligence. If our dear Doctor Strong is doing well, that is all I need to know."

"Yes, Sister Phoebe," acquiesced Miss Vesta, with silent thanksgiving.

"When you next visit Doctor Strong's room," Miss Phoebe continued,— "I regret that you should be obliged to do so, my dear Vesta, but the disparity in your years is so great as to obviate any glaring impropriety, and besides, there seems to be no help for it,—when you next visit him, I beg you to give him my kindest—yes! I am convinced that there can be no—you may say my affectionate regards, Vesta. Tell him that I find myself distinctly better to-day, thanks, no doubt, to the remedies he has prescribed; and that I trust in a short time to be able to give my personal supervision to his recovery. You may point out to him that a period of seclusion and meditation, even when not unmixed with suffering, may often be productive of beneficial results, moral as well as physical; and in a mind like his— hark! what is that sound, Vesta?"

Miss Vesta listened. "I think—it is Doctor Strong," she said. "I think he is singing, Sister Phoebe. I cannot distinguish the words; very likely some hymn his mother taught him. Dear lad!"

"He has a beautiful spirit!" said Miss Phoebe; "there are less signs of active piety than I could wish, but he has a beautiful spirit. Yes, you are right, it is a hymn, Vesta."

Even if Miss Vesta had distinguished the words, it would have made little difference, since she did not understand Italian. For this is what the young doctor was singing:

"Voi che sapete che cosa e l'amor, Donne, vedete s'io l'ho nel cuor!"

The sisters listened; Miss Phoebe erect among her pillows, her nightcap tied in a rigid little bow under her chin; Miss Vesta sitting beside her, wistful and anxious, full of tender solicitude for sister, friend, niece,—in fact, for all her little world. But neither of them could tell the young doctor what he wanted to know.

* * * * *

It was near sunset when Vesta came again into the young doctor's room. He was sitting in the big armchair by the window. He was cross, and thought medicine a profession for dogs.

"I trust you have enjoyed your afternoon!" he said, morosely. Then he looked up at the radiant face and happy eyes, and told himself that he was a squid; cuttlefish was too good a name for him.

Vesta smiled and nodded, a little out of breath.

"I ran up-stairs!" she said. "I didn't think, and I just ran. I am well, Doctor Strong, do you realise it? Oh, it is so wonderful! It is worth it all, every bit, to feel the spring coming back. You told me it would, you know; I didn't believe you, and I hasten to do homage to your superior intelligence. Hail, Solomon! Yes, I have had a most delightful afternoon, and now you shall hear all about it."

She sat down, and took out the note-book. Geoffrey had been wondering all the afternoon what colour her eyes were, now that they had ceased to be dark agates. "I know now!" he said. "They are like Mary Donnelly's."

"'Her eyes like mountain water Where it's running o'er a rock.'"

"Whose eyes?" asked Vesta. "Not Luella Slocum's? I was just going to tell you about her."

"No, not hers. How is she? You must have had a sweet time there."

Vesta gave her head a backward shake—it was a pretty way she had— and laughed. "I am sure I did her good," she said. "She was so angry at my coming, so sure I didn't know anything, and so consumed with desire to know what and where and how long I had studied, and what my father was thinking of to allow me, and what my mother would have said if she had lived to see the day, and what my aunts would say as it was, that she actually forgot her tic, poor soul, and talked a great deal, and freed her mind. It's a great thing to free the mind. But she said I need not call again; and—I'm afraid I have got you into disgrace, too, for when I said that you would come as soon as you were able, she sniffed, and said she would let you know if she wanted you. I am sorry!"

"Are you?" said Geoffrey. "I am not. She will send for Pottle to-morrow, and he will suit her exactly. Where else did you go?"

Several cases were given in detail, and for a time the talk was sternly professional. Geoffrey found his questions answered clearly and directly, with no superfluous words; moreover, there seemed to be judgment and intelligence. Well, he always said that one woman in ten thousand might—

Coming to the last case in the book, Vesta's face lightened into laughter.

"Oh, those Binney children!" she said. "They were so funny and dear! I had a delightful time there. They were all much better,—Paul's fever entirely gone, and Ellie's throat hardly inflamed at all. They wanted to get up, but I didn't think they would better before to-morrow, so we played menagerie, and had a great time."

"Played menagerie?"

"Yes. I made a hollow square with the cribs and some chairs, and they were the lions, and I was the tamer. We played for an hour,— Mrs. Binney was tired, and I made her go and lie down,—and then I sang them to sleep, dear little lambs, and came away and left them."

"I see!" said Geoffrey. "That is what made you so late. Do you think it's exactly professional to play menagerie for an hour and a half with your patients?"

Vesta laughed; the happy sound of her laughter fretted his nerves.

"I suppose that is the way you will practise, when you have taken your degree!" he said, disagreeably.

The girl flushed, and the happy light left her eyes. "Don't talk of that!" she said. "I told you I had given it up once and for all."

"But you are well now; and—I am bound to say—you seem in many ways qualified for a physician. You might try again when you are entirely strong."

"And break down again? thank you. No; I have proved to myself that I cannot do it, and there is an end."

"Then—it's no business of mine, of course—what will you do?" asked Geoffrey. His ill-temper was dying out. The sound of her voice, so full, so even, so cordial, filled him like wine. He wanted her to go on talking; it did not matter much about what.

"What will you do?" he repeated, as the girl remained silent.

"Oh, I don't know! I suppose I shall just be a plain woman the rest of my life."

"I don't think plain is exactly the word!" said Geoffrey.

"You didn't think 'pretty' was!" said Vesta; and, with a flash of laughter, she was gone.

Geoffrey had not wanted her to go. He had been alone all the afternoon. (Ah, dear Miss Vesta! was it solitude, the patient hour you spent by his side, reading to him, chatting, trying your best to cheer the depression that you partly saw, partly divined? yes; for when an experiment in soul-chemistry is going on, it is one element, and one only, that can produce the needed result!) He had been alone, I say, all the afternoon, and his head ached, and there were shooting pains in his arm, and—he used to think it would be so interesting to break a bone, that one would learn so much better in that kind of way. Well, he was learning, learning no end; only you wanted some one to talk it over with. There was no fun in knowing things if there was no one to tell about them. And—anyhow, this bandage was getting quite dry, or it would be soon. There was the bowl of water on the stand beside him, but he could not change bandages with one hand. He heard Vesta stirring about in her room, the room next his. She was singing softly to herself; it didn't trouble her much that he was all alone, and suffering a good deal. She had a cold nature. Absurd for a person to be singing to chairs and tables, when other people—

He coughed; coughed again; sighed long and audibly. The soft singing stopped; was she—

No! it went on again. He knew the tune, but he could not hear the words. There was nothing so exasperating as not to be able to place a song.—

Crash! something shivered on the floor. Vesta came running, the song still on her lips. Her patient was flushed, and looked studiously out of the window.

"What is it? Oh, the bowl! I am so sorry! How did it happen?"

"It—fell down!" said Geoffrey.

Vesta was on her knees, picking up the pieces, sopping the spilt water with a towel. He regarded her with remorseful triumph.

"You were singing!" he said, at length.

"Was I? did I disturb you? I won't—"

"No! I don't mean that. I wanted to hear the words. I—I threw the bowl down on purpose."

Vesta looked up in utter amazement; meeting the young doctor's eyes, something in them brought the lovely colour flooding over her face and neck.

"That was childish!" she said, quietly, and went on picking up the pieces. "It was a valuable bowl."

"I am—feverish!" said Geoffrey. "This bandage is getting dry, and I am all prickles."

Vesta hesitated a moment; then she laid her hand on his forehead. "You have no fever!" she said. "You are flushed and restless, but— Doctor Strong, this is convalescence!"

"Is that what you call it?" said Geoffrey.



CHAPTER XIII.

RECOVERY

"Feelin' real smart, be ye?" asked Mr. Ithuriel Butters. "Wal, I'm pleased to hear it."

Mr. Butters sat in the young doctor's second armchair, and looked at him with friendly eyes. His broad back was turned to the window, but Geoffrey faced it, and the light showed his face pale, indeed, but full of returning health and life; his arm was still in a sling, but his movements otherwise were free and unrestrained.

"You're lookin' fust-rate," said Mr. Butters. "Some different from the last time I see ye."

"I wonder what would have become of me if you had not happened along just then, Mr. Butters," said Geoffrey. "I think I owe you a great deal more than you are willing to acknowledge."

"Nothin' at all; nothin' at all!" said the old man, briskly. "I h'isted ye up out the ro'd, that was all; I sh'd have had to h'ist jest the same if ye'd be'n a critter or a lawg, takin' up the hull ro'd the way ye did."

"And how about bringing me home, three miles out of your way, and carrying me up-stairs, and all that? I suppose you would have done all that for a critter, eh?"

"Wal—depends upon the value of the critter!" said Mr. Butters, with a twinkle. "I never kep' none of mine up-stairs, but there's no knowin' these days of fancy stock. No, young man! if there's anybody for you to thank, it's that young woman. Now there's a gal—what's her name? I didn't gather it that day."

"Vesta—Miss Vesta Blyth."

"I want to know! my fust wife's name was Vesty; Vesty Barlow she was; yes, sir. I do'no' but I liked her best of any of 'em. Not but what I've had good ones since, but 'twas different then, seems' though. She was the ch'ice of my youth, ye see. Yes, sir; Vesty is a good name, and that's a good gal, if I know anything about gals. She's no kin to you, she said."

"No; none whatever."

"Nor yet you ain't keepin' company with her?"

"No-o!" cried Geoffrey, wincing.

"Ain't you asked her?"

"No! please don't—"

"Why not?" demanded Mr. Butters, with ample severity.

Geoffrey tried to laugh, and failed. "I—I can't talk about these things, Mr. Butters."

"Don't you want her?" the old man went on, pitilessly. Geoffrey looked up angrily; looked up, and met a look so kind and true and simple, that his anger died, still-born.

"Yes!" he said. "God knows I do. But you are wholly mistaken in thinking—that is—she wouldn't have me."

"I expect she would!" said Ithuriel Butters. "I expect that is jest what she would have. I see her when you was layin' there, all stove up; you might have be'n barrel-staves, the way you looked. I see her face, and I don't need to see no more."

Geoffrey tried to say something about kindness and womanly pity, but the strong old voice bore him down.

"I know what pity looks like, and I know the other thing. She's no soft-heart to squinch at the sight of blood, and that sort of foolery. Tell ye, she was jest as quiet and cool as if 'twas a church sociable, and she set that bone as easy and chirk as my woman would take a pie out the oven; but when she had you all piecened up, and stood and looked at you—wal, there!"

"Don't! I cannot let you!" cried Geoffrey. His voice was full of distress; but was it the western sun that made his face so bright?

"Wal, there's all kinds of fools," said Mr. Butters. "Got the teethache?"

"Toothache? no! why?"

"Thought you hollered as if ye had. How would you go to work to cure the teethache now, s'posin' you had it?"

"I should go to a dentist, and let him cure it for me."

"S'posin' you lived ten mile from a dentist, young feller? you're too used to settin' in the middle of creation and jerkin' the reins for the hoss to go. Jonas E. Homer had the teethache once, bad."

He paused.

"Well," said the young doctor, "who was Jonas E. Homer, and how did he cure his toothache?"

"Jonas Elimelech was his full name," said Mr. Butters, settling himself comfortably in his chair. "He's neighbour to me, about five miles out on the Buffy Landin' ro'd. Yes, he had the teethache bad. Wife wanted him to go and have 'em hauled, but he said he wouldn't have no feller goin' fishin' in his mouth. No, sir! he went and he bored a hole in the northeast side of a beech-tree, and put in a hair of a yaller dawg, and then plugged up the hole with a pine plug. That was ten years ago, and he's never had the teethache sence. He told me that himself."

"It's a good story," said the young doctor. "Do you believe it, Mr. Butters?"

"Wal, I do'no' as I exactly believe it; I was sort of illustratin' the different kinds of fools there was in the world, that's all."

They were silent. The sun went down, but the light stayed in the young doctor's face.

* * * * *

There was a commotion in the room below. Voices were raised, feminine voices, shrill with excitement. Then came a bustle on the stairs, and the sound of feet; then one voice, breathless but decided.

"I tell ye, I know the way. There's no need to show me, and I won't have it. I haven't been up these stairs for near seventy years, Phoebe, since the day of your caudle-party, but I know the way as well as you do, and I'll thank you to stay where you are."

The next moment the door opened, and Mrs. Tree stood on the threshold, panting and triumphant. Her black eyes twinkled with affection and malice. "Well, young sir!" she said, as Geoffrey ran to give her his sound arm, and led her in, and placed her in the seat of honour. "Fine doings since I last saw you! Humph! you look pretty well, considering all. Who's this? Ithuriel Butters! How do you do, Ithuriel? I haven't seen you for forty years, but I should know you in the Fiji Islands."

"I should know you, too, anywhere, Mis' Tree!" responded Mr. Butters, heartily. "I'm rejoicin' glad to see ye."

"You wear well, Ithuriel," said Mrs. Tree, kindly. "If you would cut all that mess of hair and beard, you would be a good-looking man still; but I didn't come here to talk to you."

She turned to Geoffrey in some excitement. "I'll speak right out," she said. "Now's now, and next time's never. I've let the cat out of the bag. Phoebe has found out about little Vesta's setting your arm and all, and she's proper mad. Says she'll send the child home to-morrow for good and all. She's getting on her shoes this minute; I never could abide those morocco shoes. She'll be up here in no time. I thought I'd come up first and tell you."

She looked eagerly at the young doctor; but his eyes were fixed on the window, and he scarcely seemed to hear her. Following his gaze, she saw a white dress glimmering against the soft dusk of the garden shrubs.

The young doctor rose abruptly; took one step; paused, and turned to his guest of ninety years with a little passionate gesture of appeal "I—cannot leave you," he said; "unless—just one moment—"

"My goodness gracious me!" cried Mrs. Tree. "Go this minute, child; run, do you hear? I'll take care of Ithuriel Butters. He was in my Sunday-school class, though he's only five years younger than me. Take care and don't fall!"

The last words were uttered in a small shriek, for apparently there had been but one step to the staircase.

Breathless, the old woman turned and faced the old man. "Have you got any bumblebees in your pocket this time, Ithuriel?" she asked.

"No,'m," said Ithuriel, soberly. Then they both stared out of the window with eyes that strove to be as young as they were eager.



"There he comes, full chisel!" cried Ithuriel Butters. "She don't see him. He's hollerin' to her. She's turned round. I tell ye—he's grabbed holt of her hand! he's grabbed holt of both her hands! he's—"

Who says that heroism dies with youth? Marcia Tree raised her little mitted hand, and pulled down the blind.

"It's no business of yours or mine what he's doing, Ithuriel Butters!" she said, with dignity.

Then she began to tremble. "Seventy years ago," she said, "Ira Tree proposed to me in that very garden, under that very syringa-tree. I've been a widow fifty years, Ithuriel, and it seems like yesterday." And a dry sob clicked in her throat.

"I've buried two good wives," said Mr. Butters, "and my present one seems to be failin' up some. I hope she'll live now, I reelly do."

* * * * *

"Vesta!" Miss Phoebe's voice rang sharp and shrill through the house. Miss Vesta started. She was at her evening post in the upper hall. The lamp was lighted, the prayer had been said.

"Dear Lord, I beseech thee, protect all souls at sea this night; for Jesus Christ's sake. Amen!"

But Miss Vesta was not watching the sea this time. Her eyes, too, were bent down upon the twilight garden. The lamplight fell softly there, and threw into relief the two figures pacing up and down, hand in hand, heart in heart. Miss Vesta could not hear, and would not if she could have heard, the words her children were saying; her heart was lifted as high as heaven, in peace and joy and thankfulness, and the words that sounded in her ear were spoken by a voice long silent in death.

"Vesta!"

Miss Phoebe's voice rang sharp and shrill through the silent house. Instinct and habit answered the call at once. "Yes, Sister Phoebe!"

"Stay where you are! I am coming to you. I have discovered—"

The figures below paused full in the lamplight. Two faces shone out, one all on fire with joy and wonder, the other sweet and white as the white flower at her breast.

Miss Phoebe's morocco shoes creaked around the corner of the passage.

"Good Lord, forgive me, and save all souls at sea just the same!" said Miss Vesta; and she blew out the lamp.

THE END