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"Abby, Mr. Keith does not yet know who you are. Mr. Keith, this is my cousin, Miss Brooke." "Miss Abigail Brooke, spinster," dropping him a quaint little curtsy. So this was little Lois's old aunt, Dr. Balsam's sweetheart the girl who had made him a wanderer; and she was possibly the St. Abigail of whom Alice Yorke used to speak! The old lady turned to Mrs. Wentworth.
It was late in the evening when he reached Ridgely; but he hastened at once to Dr. Balsam's office. The moon was shining, and it brought back to him the evenings on the verandah at Gates's so long ago. But it seemed to him that it was Lois Huntington who had been there among the pillows; that it was Lois Huntington who had always been there in his memory.
He wondered if she would be as she was then, as she lay dead. And once or twice he wondered if he could be losing his wits; then he gripped himself and cleared his mind. In ten minutes he was in Dr. Balsam's office. The Doctor greeted him with more coldness than he had ever shown him. Keith felt his suspicion. "Where is Lois Miss Lois Huntington? Is she ?" He could not frame the question.
Yorke so much that when he was through she said: "Doctor, I have been wondering how a man like you could be content to settle down in this mountain wilderness. I know many fashionable physicians in cities who could not have done for Alice a bit better than you have done indeed, nothing like so well with such simple appliances." Dr. Balsam's eyes rested on her gravely.
"She is decidedly quieter." Dr. Balsam's head inclined just enough to show that he heard him, and he went on stroking her hand. "Is there anything you would suggest further than has already been done?" inquired the city physician of Dr. Balsam. "No. I think not." "I must catch the 4:30 train," said the former to the younger man. "Doctor, will you drive me down to the station?" "Yes, certainly.
He got so bad the doctors said he'd be better up to Dr. Balsam's Retreat, where they could kind of soothe him down, and make him think his health was out of order, and get his mind off his writing, but he did have a pretty bad fever up there, an' ever since he thinks he was editor or somethin' on some paper, and he can tell it off straight as a string.
He began to understand Dr. Balsam's speech: "I have lived in several kinds of society, and I like the simplest best. One can get nearer to men here. I do not ask gratitude. I get affection." Keith had given notice that the school would close on a certain day. The scholars always dropped off as summer came, to work in the crops; and the attendance of late had been slim.
In other words, while he had implicit faith in the ability of Balsam's ass to speak, he was somewhat skeptical on the subject of a bear's singing; and yet he had been assured of the latter, on the testimony of his own exquisite organs. There was something in his air and manner that betrayed to the scout the utter confusion of the state of his mind.
Fresher and fresher came the wind from the sea, in puffs, in mild, sweet breezes, in steady, freshening currents, blowing the feathery crowns of the pines, setting the balsam's blue tufts rocking.
He took command and fought disease as an arch-enemy. So now. Dr. Memberly came to the bedside and began to talk in a low, professional tone. Lois shut her eyes, but her fingers closed slightly on Dr. Balsam's hand. "The medicine appears to have quieted her somewhat. I have directed the nurse to continue it," observed Dr. Memberly. "Quite so. By all means continue it," assented Dr. Locaman.
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