has refused them all. So I think there must be somebody at home.
"Claude," murmured the girl, wandering, "I never thought you would care so much. If I had thought so, I would not have encouraged you. Indeed, indeed, I would not. I thought we were only amusing ourselves."
"Claude is a pretty name. What is your own Christian name, Doctor?" asked the Colonel's wife, curiously.
"It is—in fact—it is—Claude," he replied blushing; but there was not enough light to see his blushes.
"Dear me!" said the Colonel's wife.
VI.
A few days later the patient, able to sit for a while in the shade of the verandah, was lying in a long cane chair. Beside her sat the Colonel's wife, who had nursed her through the attack. She was reading aloud to her. Suddenly she stopped. "Here comes the doctor," she said, "and, Florence, my dear, his name, you know, is Claude. I think you have got something to talk about with Claude besides the symptoms." With these words she laughed, nodded her head, and ran into the salon.
The verandah, with its green blinds of cane hanging down, and its matting on the floor, and its easy-chairs and tables, made a pretty room to look at. In the twilight the fragile figure, pale, thin, dressed in white, would have lent interest even to a stranger. To the doctor I suppose it was only a "case." He pushed the blinds aside and stepped in, strong, big, masterful. "You are much better," he said; "you will very soon be able to walk about. Only be careful for a few days. It was lucky that the attack came when it did, and not a little earlier, when we were in the thick of the trouble. Well, you won't want me much longer, I believe."
"No, thank you," she murmured, without raising her eyes.
"'Dear me!' said the Colonel's wife."
"I have had no opportunity," he said, standing over her, "of explaining that I really did not know who you were, Miss Vernon. Somehow, I didn't see your face, or I was thinking of other things; I suppose you had forgotten me; anyhow, it was not until the other day, when I was called in, that I remembered. But I daresay you have forgotten me."
"No; I have not forgotten."
"I thought that long ago you had become Lady Duport."
"No, that did not take place."
"I hear that you have been teaching since your mother's death. Do you like it?"
"Yes, I like it."
