V.

Sally did not recover rapidly from her illness: her long mental
suffering had told upon her vitality, and left her unprepared for any
strain. The little baby also languished, sharing its mother's depressed
condition. Day after day, Doctor Eben came to the house. His quick step
sounded in the hall and on the stairs; his voice rang cheery, whenever
the door of Sally's room stood open. Hetty found herself more and more
conscious of his presence: each day she felt a half guilty desire to see
him again; she caught herself watching for his knock, listening for his
step; she even went so far as to wonder in a half impatient way why he
never sent for her, to give her the directions about Sally, instead of
giving them to the nurse. She little dreamed that Doctor Eben was as
anxious to avoid seeing her, as she had been to avoid seeing him. He had
a strangely resentful feeling towards Hetty, as if she were a personal
friend who had been treacherous to him. She was the only one of all
the partisans of Doctor Tuthill that he could not sympathize with and
heartily forgive. He would have found it very hard to explain why he
thus singled out Hetty, but he had done so from the outset. Strange
forerunning instinct of love, which uttered its prophecy in an unknown
tongue in an alien country! There came a day before long, when Doctor
Eben and Hetty were forced to forget all their prejudices, and to come
together on a common ground, where no antagonisms could exist.

Sally and the baby were both very ill. Hetty, in her inexperience of
illness, had not realized how serious a symptom Sally's long continued
prostration was. In her own busy and active life, the days flew by
almost uncounted: she was out early and late, walking or riding over the