to havin' of her boarded about. If 't was so
your wife had lived I should know what I'd go down on my knees to her
to do, but I can't ask it of you to be burdened with a young child
a-growin' up."

The doctor listened patiently, though just before this he had risen
and begun to fill a small bottle at the closet shelves, which were
stocked close to their perilous edges with various drugs. Without
turning to look at his patient he said, "I wish you would take five or
six drops of this three times a day, and let me see you again within a
week or two." And while the troubled woman turned to look at him with
half-surprise, he added, "Don't give yourself another thought about
little Nan. If anything should happen to you, I shall be glad to bring
her here, and to take care of her as if she were my own. I always have
liked her, and it will be as good for me as for her. I would not
promise it for any other child, but if you had not spoken to-day, I
should have found a way to arrange with you the first chance that
came. But I'm getting to be an old fellow myself," he laughed. "I
suppose if I get through first you will be friendly to Marilla?" and
Mrs. Thacher let a faint sunbeam of a smile shine out from the depths
of the handkerchief with which she was trying to stop a great shower
of tears. Marilla was not without her little vanities, and being
thought youthful was one of the chief desires of her heart.

So Mrs. Thacher went away lighter hearted than she came. She asked the
price of the vial of medicine, and was answered that they would talk
about that another time; then there was a little sober joking about
certain patients who never paid their doctor's bills at all because of
a superstition that they would immediately require his aid again. Dr.
Leslie stood in his study doorway and watched her drive down the
street with Martin Dyer. It seemed to him only a year or two since
both the man and woman had been strong and vigorous; now they both
looked shrunken, and there was a wornness and feebleness about the
bodies which had done such good service. "Come and go," said the
doctor to himself, "one generation after another. Getting old! all the
good old-fashioned people on the farms: I never shall care so much to
be at the beck and call of their grandchildren, but I must mend up
these old folks and do the best I can for them as long as they stay;
they're good friends to me. Dear me, how it used to fret me when I was
younger to h