Doc. Gordon | Page 8

expect we should starve."
James noticed with a little surprise the doctor's hesitation before he spoke of his sister. It seemed then that he was not married. Somehow, James had thought of him as married as a matter of course.
Doctor Gordon hastened to explain, as if divining the other's attitude. "I dare say you don't know anything about my family relations," said he. "My widowed sister, Mrs. Ewing, keeps house for me. I live with her and her daughter. I think you will like them both, and I think they will like you, though I'll be hanged if I have grasped anything of you so far but your medicine-case and your voice. Your voice is all right. You give yourself away by it, and I always like that."
James straightened himself a little. There was something bantering in the other's tone. It made him feel young, and he resented being made to feel young. He himself at that time felt older than he ever would feel again. He realized that he was not being properly estimated. "If," said he, with some heat, "a patient can make out anything by my voice as to what I think, I miss my guess."
"I dare say not," said Doctor Gordon, and his own voice was as if he put the matter aside.
He spoke to the horse, whose trot quickened, and they went on in silence.
At last James began to feel rather ashamed of himself. He unstiffened. "I had quite an exciting and curious experience after I left Stanbridge," said he.
"Did you?" said the other in an absent voice.
James went on to relate the matter in detail. His companion turned an intent face upon him as he proceeded. "How far back was it?" he asked, and his tone was noticeably agitated.
"Just after I left the last house in Stanbridge. We went on together to Westover. She mentioned something about going to see a friend there. I think Lipton was the name, and she left me suddenly."
"What was the girl like?"
"Small and slight, and very pretty."
"Dressed in brown?"
"Yes."
"How did the man look?" Doctor Gordon's voice fairly alarmed the young man.
"I hardly can say. I saw him distinctly, but only for a second. The impression he gave me was of a middle-aged man, although he looked young."
"Good-looking?"
"My God, no!" said James, as the man's face seemed to loom up before him again. "He looked like the devil."
"A man may look like the devil, and yet be distinctly handsome."
"Well, I suppose he was; but give me the homeliest face on earth rather than a face like that man's, if I must needs have anything to do with him." The young fellow's voice broke. He was very young. He caught the other man by his rough coat sleeve. "See here, Doctor Gordon," said he, "my profession is to save life. That is the main end of it but, but--I don't honestly know what I should think right, if I were asked to save that man's life."
"Was he well dressed?"
"More than well dressed, richly, a fur-lined coat--"
"Tall?"
"Yes, above the medium, but he stooped a little, like a cat, sort of stretched to the ground like an animal, when he hurried along after the girl in front of me."
Doctor Gordon struck the horse with his whip, and he broke into a gallop. "We are almost home," said he. "I shall have to leave you with slight ceremony. I have to go out again immediately."
Doctor Gordon had hardly finished speaking before they drew up in front of a white house on the left of the road. "Get out," he said peremptorily to James. The front door opened, and a parallelogram of lighted interior became visible. In this expanse of light stood a tall woman's figure. "Clara, this is the new doctor," called out Doctor Gordon. "Take him in and take care of him."
"Have you got to go away again?" said the woman's voice. It was sweet and rich, but had a curious sad quality in it.
"Yes, I must. I shall not be gone long. Don't wait supper."
"Aren't you going to change the horse?"
"Can't stop. Go right in, Elliot. Clara, look after him."
James Elliot found himself in the house, confronting the most beautiful woman he had ever seen, as the rapid trot of the doctor's horse receded in vistas of sound.
James almost gasped. He had never seen such a woman. He had seen pretty girls. Now he suddenly realized that a girl was not a woman, and no more to be compared with her than an uncut gem with one whose facets take the utmost light.
The boy stood staring at this wonderful woman. She extended her hand to him, but he did not see it. She said some gracious words of greeting to him, but he did not hear them. She might have been the