'
and answered so pertly--'Nobody asked you, sir, she said,' it would
have done credit to an exhibition. Her mother sprang up and kissed her
rapturously, crying--'Isn't she the dearest and sweetest thing and the
smartest! Think of her learning that and acting it off so completely,
and not three years old! She is smarter than Violet'--and then Violet
set up such a howl! Her mother pacified her by saying Marilla should
tell her a piece, and after several efforts Cinderella did induce her
to say by a great deal of prompting 'Milkman, Milkman, where have you
been?' Think of the wear on the child's nerves, and she looked so
tired. I really couldn't stand it a moment longer. They think she has
nothing to do but just amuse those two strong irrepressible children
who climb over her and torment her in every fashion. I can't stand it.
I hardly slept last night thinking of it."

"Can't you bring her over for a visit?"

"I thought of proposing that. If I could persuade her to transfer the
child to me--"

"But if she gets another nurse?"

"Yes, I must try. The strain on her is too great, and now for almost a
week she has not been out of the house; Mrs. Borden bewails it for the
childrens' sake. She thinks only of them with a mother's selfishness,
and she doesn't give Marilla credit for these pretty ways or their
intelligence. She is just their nurse girl. It is a cruel waste of the
child's gifts."

"I'd like to see Dr. Baker; most of all I'd like to see Marilla, but
it wouldn't be etiquette to call."

"I'll go tomorrow with courage enough to have a gentle talk or a
straight out one," said Miss Armitage resolutely. "We try to save
other lives, why not this one? And this one is dear to me. It has so
much of promise in it, and life gets lonely sometimes."

He longed to come into it, but he kept his promise. Until she made
some sign he must be content with friendship. He rose abruptly and
said he must be going. She did not detain him.

It was raining a-softly now and he hurried along. His office was in a
little ell part in a rather inviting looking house, and he took his
meals with the tenant. The office boy was on the lookout for him, it
was time he went home.

"There's a gentleman in there waiting for you," he said with his
good-night.

The gentleman was comfortably ensconced in the Morris chair, smoking a
cigar. Doctor Richards took a second look.

"Why, Lorimer!" he exclaimed. "Where have you dropped from? I haven't