"I beg your pardon," he exclaimed. "I did n't look at it"; but he now did
so, where he held it crumpled in the palm of his left hand. "My mother
said it was a young lady, and I did n't look. Will you will you sit down,
Dr. Breen?" He bustled in getting her several chairs. "I live off here in
a corner, and I have never happened to meet any ladies of our profession
before. Excuse me, if I spoke under a,--mistaken impression. I--I--I
should not have--ah--taken you for a physician. You"--He checked himself,
as if he might have been going to say that she was too young and too
pretty. "Of course, I shall have pleasure in consulting with you in
regard to your friend's case, though I've no doubt you are doing all that
can be done." With a great show of deference, he still betrayed something
of the air of one who humors a joke; and she felt this, but felt that she
could not openly resent it.

"Thank you," she returned with dignity, indicating with a gesture of her
hand that she would not sit down again. "I am sorry to ask you to come so
far."

"Oh, not at all. I shall be driving over in that direction at any rate.
I've a patient near there." He smiled upon her with frank curiosity, and
seemed willing to detain her, but at a loss how to do so. "If I had n't
been stupid from my nap I should have inferred a scientific training from
your statement of your friend's case." She still believed that he was
laughing at her, and that this was a mock but she was still helpless to
resent it, except by an assumption of yet colder state. This had
apparently no effect upon Dr. Mulbridge. He continued to look at her with
hardly concealed amusement, and visibly to grow more and more conscious
of her elegance and style, now that she stood before him. There had been
a time when, in planning her career, she had imagined herself studying a
masculine simplicity and directness of address; but the over-success of