"Miss Drane is not here," said Mrs. Tolbridge; "but if you want to see her, you can do it to-morrow, if you go to Cobhurst. She and her mother are now living there, boarding with the Haverleys."

"Living at Cobhurst!" exclaimed Dora; and as she uttered these words, the girl turned pale.

"Heavens!" mentally e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the doctor's wife. "I do nothing this day but explode bombsh.e.l.ls."

In a moment Dora recovered nearly all her color, and laughed.

"It is so funny," she said, "that all sorts of things happen in this town without our knowing it. Is she still going to be the doctor's secretary?"

"Yes, she can do her work out there as well as here."

Dora looked out of the window as if she saw something in the garden, and Mrs. Tolbridge charitably took her out to show her some new dahlias.

Early the next morning, Dr. Tolbridge drove into the Witton yard. No matter who waited for him, he would not delay this visit. When he asked for Miss Panney, he had a strong idea that the old lady would refuse to see him. But in an astonishingly short s.p.a.ce of time, she marched into the parlor, every war-flag flying, and closed the door behind her.

Without shaking hands or offering the visitor any sort of salutation, she seated herself in a chair in the middle of the room. "Now," said she, "don't lose any time in saying what you have got to say."

Not encouraged by this reception, the doctor could not instantly arrange what he had to say. But he shortly got his ideas into order, and proceeded to lay the case in its most favorable light before the old lady, dwelling particularly on the reasons why she had not been consulted in the affair.

Miss Panney heard him to the end without a change in the rigidity of her face and att.i.tude. "Very well, then," she said, when he had finished, "I see exactly what you have done. You have thrown me aside for a cook."

"Not at all!" exclaimed the doctor. "I had no idea of throwing you aside.

In fact, Miss Panney, I never thought of you in the matter at all."

"Exactly, exactly," said the old lady, with emphatic sharpness; "you never thought of me at all. That is the sum and substance of what you have done. I gave you my confidence. I told you my intentions, my hopes, the plan which was to crown and finish the work of my life. I told you I would make the grandson of the only man I ever loved my heir, and I would do this, because I wished him to marry the daughter of the man who was my best friend on earth. The marriage of these two and the union of the estate of Cobhurst with the wealth of the Bannisters was a project which, as I told you, had grown dear to my heart, and for which I was thinking and dreaming and working. All this you knew, and without a word to me, and if you speak the truth, all for the sake of your wretched stomach, you clap into Cobhurst a girl who will be engaged to Ralph Haverley in less than a month."

The doctor moved impatiently in his chair.

"Nonsense, Miss Panney. Cicely Drane will not harm your plans. She is a sensible, industrious girl, who attends to her own business, and--"

"Precisely," said Miss Panney; "and her own business will be to settle for life at Cobhurst. She may not be courting young Haverley to-day, but she will begin to-morrow. She will do it, and what is more, she would be a fool if she did not. It does not matter what sort of a girl she is;" and now Miss Panney began to speak louder, and stood up; "it does not matter if she had five legs and two heads; you have no right to thrust any intruder into a household which I had taken into my charge, and for which I had my plans, all of which you knew. You are a false friend, Dr. Tolbridge, and at your doorstep I have shaken the dust from my skirts and my feet." And with a quick step and a high head, she marched out of the room.

The doctor took a little book out of his pocket, and on a blank leaf wrote the following:--

Rx.

Pota.s.s. Bromid. 3iij Tr. Dig. Natis. m. x.x.x Tr. Lavand. Comp. ad 3iij M.S. teaspoonful every three hours.

H. D.

Having sent this to Miss Panney by a servant, he went his way. Driving along, his conscience stung him a little when he thought of the fable his wife had told him; but the moral of the fable had made but little impression upon him, and as an antidote to the sting he applied his conviction that matchmaking was a bad business, and that in love affairs, as well as in many diseases, the very best thing to do was to let nature take its course.

When Miss Panney read the paper which had been sent to her, her eyes flashed, and then she laughed.

"The wretch!" she exclaimed; "it is just like him." And in the afternoon she sent to her apothecary in Thorbury for the medicine prescribed. "If it cools me down," she said to herself, "I shall be able to work better."

CHAPTER XXVI

DORA COMES AND SEES

The call by the Bannisters at Cobhurst was made as planned. Had storm or sudden war prevented Mrs. Bannister and Herbert from going, Dora would have gone by herself. She did not appear to be in her usual state of health that day, and Mrs. Bannister, noticing this, and attributing it to Dora's great fondness for fruit at this season and neglect of more solid food, had suggested that perhaps it might be well for her not to take a long drive that afternoon. But this remark was added to the thousand suggestions made by the elder lady and not accepted by the younger.

Miriam was in the great hall when the Bannister family drove up, and she greeted her visitors with a well-poised affability which rather surprised Mrs. Bannister. Dora instantly noticed that she was better dressed than she had yet seen her.

When they were seated in the parlor, Mrs. Bannister announced that their call was intended to include Mrs. Drane and her daughter, and Herbert hoped that this time he would be able to see Mr. Haverley.

Mrs. Drane was sent for, but Miriam did not know where her brother and Miss Drane should be looked for. She had seen them walk by the back piazza, but did not notice in what direction they had gone. At this moment there ran through Dora a sensation similar to that occasioned by a mild galvanic shock, but as she was looking out of the open door, the rest of the company saw no signs of this.

"Excuse me," said Mrs. Bannister, in a low voice, and speaking rather rapidly, "but I thought that Miss Drane was working for Dr. Tolbridge, copying, or something of that kind."

"She is," answered Miriam, "but she has her regular hours, and stops at five o'clock, just as she did when she was in the doctor's house."

When Mrs. Drane had appeared and the visitors had been presented, Miriam said that she would go herself and look for Ralph and Miss Drane. She thought now that it was very likely they were in the orchard.

"Let me go with, you," exclaimed Dora, springing to her feet, and in a moment she and Miriam had left the house.

"I heard her say," said Miriam, "that she wanted some summer apples, fresh from the tree, and that is the reason why I suppose they are in the orchard. You never knew anybody so wild about country things as Miss Drane is. And she knows so little about them too."

"Do you like her?" asked Dora.

"Ever so much. I think she is as nice as can be. She is a good deal older than I am, but sometimes it seems as if it were the other way. I suppose one reason is that she wants to know so much, and I think I must like to tell people things--nice people, I mean."

Dora's mind was in a state of lively receptivity, and it received an impression from Miriam's words that might be of use hereafter. But now they had reached the orchard, and there, standing on a low branch of a tree, was Ralph, and below was Miss Drane. Her laughing face was turned upward, and she was holding her straw hat to catch an apple, but it was plain that she was not skilled in that sort of exercise, and when the apple dropped, it barely touched the rim of the hat and rolled upon the ground, and then they both laughed as if they had known each other for twenty years.

"What a little thing," said Miss Bannister.

"She is small," answered Miriam, "but isn't she pretty and graceful? And her clothes fit her so beautifully. I am sure you will like her."

Ralph came down from the tree, the straw hat was replaced on the head of Miss Drane, and then came introduction and greeting. Never before had Dora Bannister found it so hard to meet any one as she found it to meet these two. She was only eighteen, and had had no experience in comporting herself in an ordinary way when her every impulse prompted her to do or say something quite extraordinary. But she was a girl who could control herself, and she now controlled herself so well, that had Miss Panney or Mrs. Tolbridge been there they would instantly have suspected what was meant by so much self-control. She greeted Miss Drane with much suavity, and asked her if she liked apples.

As the party started for the house, Dora, who was a quick walker, was not so quick as usual, and Ralph naturally slackened his pace a little. In a few moments Miriam and Miss Drane were hurrying toward the house, considerably in advance of the others.

"It is so nice," said Dora, "for your sister to have ladies in the house with her. I have been wanting to see her ever so much, and was afraid something was the matter with her, especially as you did not come for your dog."

As Ralph was explaining his apparent ungraciousness, Dora's soul was roughly shaken. She was angry with him and wanted to show it, but she saw clearly that this would be unsafe. Her hold upon him was very slight, and a few unwise words now might make him no more than a mere acquaintance.

She did not wish to say words that would do that, but if she held him by a cord ever so slender, she would obey the promptings of her soul and endeavor to draw him a little toward her. She would take the risks of that, for if he drifted away from her, the cord would be as likely to break as if she drew upon it.

"Oh yes," she said, "I knew all the time why you and Miriam did not come to make a regular society call, but I did suppose that you would drop in to see about Congo. As soon as I got home, after I promised him to you, I began to educate him to cease to care for me, and to care for you. If you had been there, all this would have been easy enough, but as it was, I had to get Herbert or the coachman to take him out walking at the times I used to take him, and when he was tied up I kept away from his little house altogether, so that he should become accustomed to do without me. I stopped feeding him, and made Herbert do that whenever he had time, and I insisted that he should wear a big straw hat, which he does not like, but which is a good deal like the one you wear, and which I thought might have an influence on the mind of Congo."

This touched Ralph, and he did not wish that Miss Bannister should suppose that he thought so little of a gift of which she thought so much.

And in order to entirely remove any suspicion of ungratefulness, he endeavored to make her understand that he had wished very much to go to see the dog, but wished much more to go to see her.

"I hate a great many of these social rules," he said, "and although I did not know any of the rest of your family, I knew you, and felt very much inclined to call on you and let the customs take care of themselves."

"I wish you had!" exclaimed Dora; "I like to see people brave enough to trample on customs."