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I went to Atlantic City for the American
Medical Association meeting, and I spent practically a week in New
York! But I never saw a town that had such up-and-coming people as
Gopher Prairie. Bresnahan--you know--the famous auto
manufacturer--he comes from Gopher Prairie. Born and brought up
there! And it's a darn pretty town. Lots of fine maples and box-elders,
and there's two of the dandiest lakes you ever saw, right near town!
And we've got seven miles of cement walks already, and building more

every day! Course a lot of these towns still put up with plank walks, but
not for us, you bet!"
"Really?"
(Why was she thinking of Stewart Snyder?)
"Gopher Prairie is going to have a great future. Some of the best dairy
and wheat land in the state right near there--some of it selling right now
at one-fifty an acre, and I bet it will go up to two and a quarter in ten
years!"
"Is----Do you like your profession?"
"Nothing like it. Keeps you out, and yet you have a chance to loaf in
the office for a change."
"I don't mean that way. I mean--it's such an opportunity for sympathy."
Dr. Kennicott launched into a heavy, "Oh, these Dutch farmers don't
want sympathy. All they need is a bath and a good dose of salts."
Carol must have flinched, for instantly he was urging, "What I mean
is--I don't want you to think I'm one of these old salts-and-quinine
peddlers, but I mean: so many of my patients are husky farmers that I
suppose I get kind of case-hardened."
"It seems to me that a doctor could transform a whole community, if he
wanted to--if he saw it. He's usually the only man in the neighborhood
who has any scientific training, isn't he?"
"Yes, that's so, but I guess most of us get rusty. We land in a rut of
obstetrics and typhoid and busted legs. What we need is women like
you to jump on us. It'd be you that would transform the town."
"No, I couldn't. Too flighty. I did used to think about doing just that,
curiously enough, but I seem to have drifted away from the idea. Oh,
I'm a fine one to be lecturing you!"

"No! You're just the one. You have ideas without having lost feminine
charm. Say! Don't you think there's a lot of these women that go out for
all these movements and so on that sacrifice----"
After his remarks upon suffrage he abruptly questioned her about
herself. His kindliness and the firmness of his personality enveloped
her and she accepted him as one who had a right to know what she
thought and wore and ate and read. He was positive. He had grown
from a sketched-in stranger to a friend, whose gossip was important
news. She noticed the healthy solidity of his chest. His nose, which had
seemed irregular and large, was suddenly virile.
She was jarred out of this serious sweetness when Marbury bounced
over to them and with horrible publicity yammered, "Say, what do you
two think you're doing? Telling fortunes or making love? Let me warn
you that the doc is a frisky bacheldore, Carol. Come on now, folks,
shake a leg. Let's have some stunts or a dance or something."
She did not have another word with Dr. Kennicott until their parting:
"Been a great pleasure to meet you, Miss Milford. May I see you some
time when I come down again? I'm here quite often--taking patients to
hospitals for majors, and so on."
"Why----"
"What's your address?"
"You can ask Mr. Marbury next time you come down--if you really
want to know!"
"Want to know? Say, you wait!"

II
Of the love-making of Carol and Will Kennicott there is nothing to be
told which may not be heard on every summer evening, on every

shadowy block.
They were biology and mystery; their speech was slang phrases and
flares of poetry; their silences were contentment, or shaky crises when
his arm took her shoulder. All the beauty of youth, first discovered
when it is passing--and all the commonplaceness of a well-to-do
unmarried man encountering a pretty girl at the time when she is
slightly weary of her employment and sees no glory ahead nor any man
she is glad to serve.
They liked each other honestly--they were both honest. She was
disappointed by his devotion to making money, but she was sure that
he did not lie to patients, and that he did keep up with the medical
magazines. What aroused her to something more than liking was his
boyishness when they went tramping.
They walked from St. Paul down the river to Mendota, Kennicott more
elastic-seeming in a cap and a soft crepe shirt, Carol youthful in a
tam-o'-shanter of