friends by their first names to every one, "that if I could once get my
digestion all right, then the cough would stop of itself. The doctor
said--Dr. Nixon, that is--that it was more than half the digestion any
way. But just as soon as I eat anything--or if I over-eat a little--then
that tickling in my throat begins, and then I commence coughing; and I'm
back just where I was. It's the digestion. I oughtn't to have eaten that
mince pie, yesterday."

"No," admitted Barlow. Then he said, in indirect defence of the kitchen,
"I think you had n't ought to be out in the night air,--well, not a great
deal."

"Well, I don't suppose it does do me much good," Mrs. Maynard said,
turning her eyes seaward.

Barlow let his hand drop from the piazza post, and slouched in-doors; but
he came out again as if pricked by conscience to return.

"After all, you know, it did n't cure him."

"What cure him?" asked Mrs. Maynard.

"The whiskey with the white-pine chips in it."

"Cure who?"

"My brother."

"Oh! Oh, yes! But mine's only bronchial. I think it might do me good. I
shall tell Grace about it."