r, cruelly. "What is it else?"

"Why, I hardly know what to call it, except that it's a conviction
that--well, that to pay is best; that it's the nearest to justice we can
get, and that"--he spoke faster--"that it's simply duty to choose
justice when we can and mercy when we must. There, I've hit it out!" He
laughed again. "Don't you see, Doctor? Justice when we may--mercy when
we must! It's your own principles!"

The Doctor looked straight at the mantel-piece as he asked:--

"Where did you get that idea?"

"I don't know; partly from nowhere, and"--

"Partly from Mary," interrupted the Doctor. He put out his long white
palm. "It's all right. Give me the money." Richling counted it into his
hand. He rolled it up and stuffed it into his portemonnaie.

"You like to part with your hard earnings, do you, Richling?"

"Earnings can't be hard," was the reply; "it's borrowings that are
hard."

The Doctor assented.

"And, of course," said Richling, "I enjoy paying old debts." He stood
and leaned his head in his hand with his elbow on the mantel. "But, even
aside from that, I'm happy."

"I see you are!" remarked the physician, emphatically, catching the arms
of his chair and drawing his feet closer in. "You've been smiling worse
than a boy with a love-letter."

"I've been hoping you'd ask me what's the matter."

"Well, then, Richling, what is the matter?"

"Mary has a daughter."

"What!" cried the Doctor, springing up with a radiant face, and grasping
Richling's hand in both his own.

Richling laughed aloud, nodded, laughed again, and gave either eye a
quick, energetic wipe with all his fingers.

"Doctor," he said, as the physician sank back into his chair, "we want
to name"--he hesitated, stood on one foot and leaned again against the
shelf--"we want to call her by the name of--if we may"--

The Doctor looked up as if with alarm, and John said, timidly,--"Alice!"

Dr. Sevier's eyes--what was the matter? His mouth quivered. He nodded
and whispered huskily:--

"All right."

After a long pause Richling expressed the opinion that he had better be
going, and the Doctor did not indicate any difference of conviction. At
the door the Doctor asked:--

"If the fever should break out this summer, Richling, will you go away?"

"No."

CHAPTER XXXVII.

PESTILENCE.

On the twentieth of June, 1858, an incident occurred in New Orleans
which challenged special attention from the medical profession. Before