could not say point-blank to Mrs.
Ashleigh, 'Dr. Fenwick admires your daughter, would you object to him
as a son-in-law?' Of course I could not touch at all on the secret with
which you intrusted me; but I have not the less arrived at a conclusion,
in agreement with my previous belief, that not being a woman of the
world, Annie Ashleigh has none of the ambition which women of the world
would conceive for a daughter who has a good fortune and considerable
beauty; that her predominant anxiety is for her child's happiness, and
her predominant fear is that her child will die. She would never oppose
any attachment which Lilian might form; and if that attachment were for
one who had preserved her daughter's life, I believe her own heart would
gratefully go with her daughter's. So far, then, as honour is concerned,
all scruples vanish."

I sprang from my seat, radiant with joy. Mrs. Poyntz dryly continued:
"You value yourself on your common-sense, and to that I address a few
words of counsel which may not be welcome to your romance. I said that
I did not think you and Lilian would suit each other in the long
run; reflection confirms me in that supposition. Do not look at me so
incredulously and so sadly. Listen, and take heed. Ask yourself what, as
a man whose days are devoted to a laborious profession, whose ambition
is entwined with its success, whose mind must be absorbed in its
pursuits,--ask yourself what kind of a wife you would have sought to
win; had not this sudden fancy for a charming face rushed over your
better reason, and obliterated all previous plans and resolutions.
Surely some one with whom your heart would have been quite at rest; by
whom your thoughts would have been undistracted from the channels into
which your calling should concentrate their flow; in short, a serene
companion in the quiet holiday of a trustful home! Is it not so?"

"You interpret my own thoughts when they have turned towards marriage.
But what is there in Lilian Ashleigh that should mar the picture you
have drawn?"

"What is there in Lilian Ashleigh which in the least accords with the
picture? In the first place, the wife of a young physician should not
be his perpetual patient. The more he loves her, and the more worthy she
may be of love, the more her case will haunt him wherever he goes. When
he returns home, it is not to a holiday; the patient he most cares for,
the anxiety that most gnaws him, awaits him there."

"But, good hea