he sat
with patient set smile, and endured it, making what he seemed to
think were little pleasantries to Julia Cloud, who sat by, busy with
some embroidery. She, poor lady, was divided between a wicked
delight at the daring of the children and a horror of reproach
that they should be treating a college professor in this rude manner.
She certainly gave him no encouragement; and, when he at last rose to
go, saying he had spent a very pleasant and profitable evening getting
acquainted with his students, and he thought he should soon repeat
it, she did not ask him to return. But he was a man of the kind who
needs no encouragement, and he did return many times and often,
until he became a fixed institution, which taxed all their faculties
inventing ways of escape from him. The winter went, and Dr. Bowman
became the one fly in the pleasant ointment of Cloud Villa.

"We'll just have to send Cloudy away awhile, or put her to bed and
pretend she is sick every time he comes, or something!" said Leslie
one night, after his departure had made them free to express their
feelings. "We've tried everything else. He just won't take a hint!
What do you say, Cloudy; will you play sick?"

"My dear!" said Julia Cloud aghast, "he doesn't come to see me! What
on earth put that in your head?" Her face was flaming scarlet, and
distress showed in every feature.

The children fairly shouted.

"You dear, old, blind Cloudy, of course he does! Who on earth else
would he come to see?"

"But," said Julia Cloud, tears coming into her eyes, "he mustn't. I
don't want to see him! Mercy!"

"That's all right, Cloudy; you should worry! I'll go tell him so if
you want me to."

"Allison! You wouldn't!" said Julia Cloud, aghast.

"No, of course not, Cloudy, but we'll find a way to get rid of the old
pill if we have to move away for a while."

Nevertheless, the old pill continued to come early and often, and
there seemed no escape; for he was continually stealing in on their
privacy at the most unexpected times and acting as if he were sure of
a welcome. The children froze him, and were rude, and Julia Cloud
withdrew farther and farther; but nothing seemed to faze him.

"It's too bad to have so much sweetness wasted," mocked Leslie one
night at the supper-table when their unwelcome visitor had been a
subject of discussion. "Miss Detliff is eating her heart out for him.
She's always noseying round in the hall when his class is out, and
it's about