and a doctor really needs the comfort, the
satisfaction nothing else can give. I've never had a home though I've
dreamed of one, but there must be another person in it. I'm not of the
hermit sort. I want some one to be merry with me and to comfort me
when the skies are dark and lowering."

"Oh, Dr. Richards, you should marry," exclaimed Mrs. Warren,
impetuously.

"I've been so engrossed--and this sort of vision has come to my very
door as it were, and I have let it in. For a few years Marilla will
need watchful care from some one who can understand the weak points. I
should get a nice, motherly woman who would be sweet and tender to
her, companionable as well. For you see she must go to some one for a
home."

"And we would gladly take her in here," said Mrs. Warren. "She has
really won our hearts."

He would do Miss Armitage full justice, at least he thought it so
then. He related her kindness, her generosity, but she had been tender
and sympathetic to many another child he remembered, yet he could not
quite still the one cry he had heard from her.

"Thank you most sincerely," he returned. "I am glad she has found some
relatives who have taken her in in this cordial manner. I want her to
remain warm friends with you all. Of course until I was settled to my
liking her home would be with Miss Armitage and she could come
whenever you would like to have her. A young girl needs friends of her
own kind, whose interests and hopes are similar."

They discussed the matter from more than one point of view. At first
Lorimer had tried to banter him out of the plan, insisting that the
guardianship would be sufficient. There was something in his earnest
desire that touched the heart of the man of wide experience. He
wondered why he could not be as persistent to win the lady! Perhaps
she would follow the child.

She came in radiant and full of joy. It was such a splendid Sunday
School. She could enjoy it thoroughly with no bothering Jack to think
about.

Lorimer made his adieu but the doctor remained. They sang in the
evening. She caught any tune so readily, and a little bird of joy kept
time in her heart. She had only to glance up in the doctor's eyes to
know there was a kindred delight in his.

She spent most of the next morning writing to fairy godmother. There
was so much to say, for everything was so new, so different from her
life hitherto. Oh, she was so glad she did not have to go back to
that! No one had been rea