Dr. Eben laughed outright. He could not help it.

"There!" said Hetty, triumphantly; "that's right; I like to hear you
laugh now; for goodness' sake, let's forget all this. I will, if you
will; and we will be all the better friends for it perhaps. At any rate,
you'll be all the more friend to me for having saved you from making
such a blunder as thinking you were in love with me."

Dr. Eben was on the point of persisting farther; but he suddenly thought
to himself:

"I'd better not: I might make her angry. I'll take the friendship
platform for the present: that is some gain."

"You will permit me then to be your friend, Miss Gunn," he said. "Why,
certainly," said Hetty, in a matter-of-fact way: "I thought we were very
good friends now."

"But you recollect, you distinctly told me I was to come only as
physician to Mrs. Little," retorted the doctor.

Hetty colored: the darkness sheltered her.

"Oh! that was a long time ago," she said in a remorseful tone: "I should
be very ungrateful if I had not forgotten that."

And with this Dr. Eben was forced to be contented. When he thought the
whole thing over, he admitted to himself that he had fared as well as he
had a right to expect, and that he had gained a very sure vantage,
in having committed the loyal Hetty to the assertion that they were