don't care to name your price, and unless that price is within
reason?"

After some minutes of hesitation the old woman drew a deep breath.
"Well," she said, with the determination of one who expected to be
scoffed at, "I won't take a _sou_ less than my brother paid."

"Come on, Mother," said the Doctor, "what _did_ your brother pay? No
nonsense, you know."

"Well, if you must know--it was FIVE THOUSAND FRANCS, and I
can't and won't sell it for less. There, now!"

There was a long silence.

The Doctor and his companion avoided one another's eyes. After a
while, he said in an undertone, in English: "By Jove, I'm going to buy
it."

"No, no," remonstrated his companion, her eyes gazing down the garden
vista to where the wistaria and clematis and flaming trumpet flower
flaunted on the old wall. "I am going to have it--I thought of it
first. I want it."

"So do I," laughed the Doctor. "Never wanted anything more in all my
life."

"For how long," she asked, "would a rover like you want this?"

"Rover yourself! And you? Besides what difference does it make how