wanted a few minutes' talk with you, and
this has just happened luckily; we can
have it without any interruption."

He stretched out his hand, and helped
Marian into the seat by his side, then gave
the brisk little pony his head, and they
rattled cheerily along.

"Let me see, my dear. What was I
saying?" said the doctor, after the silence
of a few minutes. "I just remember that
I ought to have called in the village to see
little Boyd, who's in for measles, I suspect.
I must start a memorandum book, my
memory is beginning to fail me. What
was I saying, my dear?"

"You were saving that you wanted to
talk to me—about Woolgreaves, I think it
must have been."

"About Woolgreaves—the palace, as I
called it—oh, yes, that was it. See here,
child; I'm the oldest friend you have in the
world, and I hope one of the truest; and
I want you to answer my questions frankly,
and without reserve, just as if I were your
father, you know."

"I will do so," said Marian, after a faint
flutter at her heart, caused by the notion of
the little doctor, good little soul as he was,
comparing himself with her dead father.

"That's right!" said Dr. Osborne. "I
knew you almost before you came into the
world, and that gives me some right to
your confidence. Now, then, are you happy
at Woolgreaves?"

Marian hesitated a moment before she
replied. "Happier than I thought I could
have been—yet!"

"Ah, that's right and straightforward.
Mind, in all these questions I'm alluding
to you, not to your mother. I know her,
charming lady, affectionate, and all that;
but clinging and unreasoning, likes to lie
where she falls, and so on, whereas you've
got a head on your shoulders, finely
developed and—so on. Now, are they all kind
to you at Woolgreaves? Old gentleman
kind?"

"Most kind!"

"Of course he is. Never was a man so
full of heart as he is! If he had only been
at home when your poor father—ah, well!
That's no matter now."

"What's that you said, Dr. Osborne—
that about my father?"

"Stupid old fool to go blundering into
such a subject! Why couldn't I have let
it alone! 'Let the dead past bury its dead.'
What's that I've heard my girl sing," the
old gentleman muttered to himself. Then
aloud—" Nothing, my dear! I was only
thinking that if Mr. Creswell had been at
home just at the time I dare say we might
have made some arrangement, and had
Godby down from St. Vitus, and then—"

"And then my father need not have died
for the want of a hundred and thirty
guineas! Oh, don't think I forget!" and
there came into the girl's face the hard
stony rigid look which Dr. Osborne
remembered there so well on the night of her
father's death, six months before.

"Well!" said the little doctor, laying
the whip across his knees and blowing his
nose so loudly that the pony shied at the
noise—"well, well, dear, Mr. Creswell's
absence at that particular time was, to say
the least of it, unfortunate; we may say
that! Now, what about the girls; are
they kind?"

"Very, in their way!"

"Good!" said the little doctor, bringing
his hand down with a ringing slap on the
chaise apron, "I like that! dry, deuced
dry! Like your poor father, that! 'In
their way.' Ha, ha! I understand!
Their way is not much yours?"

"They are very good tempered and
polite, and press one to eat and drink a
great deal, and hand chairs and footstools,
and always sing when they are asked.
And," added Marian, after a moment's
pause, and under a fear that she had been
unduly cynical, "and they are most attentive
and affectionate to mamma."

"I'm delighted to hear that, for that's
just as it should be, just as one would have
wished it to turn out. Oh, yes; quite
ladies, with all the feelings and perceptions
of ladies, and talking to your mother
nicely, and so on. Not too bright—not to
be compared with you, or my girl. Ah,
there would have been a companion for
you, my dear; all soul, and such an arm
for the harp, but married to the coastguard
in Dorsetshire!—but still nice girls. Well,
I'm glad you give me this account, my
dear, for it suits exactly the suggestion I
was about to make. But before I made it
I wanted to be quite sure of your position
at Woolgreaves, and to know for certain
that you were liked by all the family."

"You are not certain of that yet, doctor!
There is one of the family about whom you
have made no inquiry."

"One of the family—at Woolgreaves?
Oh, by Jove, Tom, Master Tom! I recollect
now—a most important personage in
his own esteem, and really some one to be
thought of in such a matter as this. And
how does Master Tom behave to you?"