Gardner Coolidge bowed to the office nurse, whom he had already
classified as a very attractively superior person and well worth a good
salary; then went on into the consulting room, where an open window had
freshened the small place beyond any possibility of its being called
stuffy. As he closed the window with a shiver and looked about him,
glancing into the white-tiled surgery beyond; he recognized the fact
that, though he might be in the workshop of a village practitioner, it
was a workshop which did not lack the tools of the workman thoroughly
abreast of the times.

Burns came back, his face bright with pleasure in the unexpected
appearance of his friend. He stood looking across the small room at
Coolidge, as if he could get a better view of the whole man at a little
distance. The two men were a decided contrast to each other. Redfield
Pepper Burns, known to all his intimates, and to many more who would not
have ventured to call him by that title, as "Red Pepper Burns," on
account of the combination of red head, quick temper, and wit which were
his most distinguishing characteristics of body and mind, was a stalwart
fellow whose weight was effectually kept down by his activity. His white
linen office jacket was filled by powerful shoulders, and the perfectly
kept hands of the surgeon gave evidence, as such hands do, of their
delicacy of touch, in the very way in which Burns closed the door behind
him.

Gardner Coolidge was of a different type altogether. As tall as Burns,
he looked taller because of his slender figure and the distinctive
outlines of his careful dress. His face was dark and rather thin,
showing sensitive lines about the eyes and mouth, and a tendency to
melancholy in the eyes themselves, even when lighted by a smile, as now.
He was manifestly the man of worldly experience, with fastidious tastes,