y much--"

"But I do care very much."

"If you did, you would not come here for nothing day after day."

"I do care for money very much. I have sometimes nearly broken my
heart because I could not get opportunities of earning it. It is the
best friend that a man can have--"

"Oh, Dr Crofts!"

"--the best friend that a man can have, if it be honestly come by. A
woman can hardly realise the sorrow which may fall upon a man from
the want of such a friend."

"Of course a man likes to earn a decent living by his profession; and
you can do that."

"That depends upon one's ideas of decency."

"Ah! mine never ran very high. I've always had a sort of aptitude for
living in a pigsty;--a clean pigsty, you know, with nice fresh bean
straw to lie upon. I think it was a mistake when they made a lady of
me. I do, indeed."

"I do not," said Dr Crofts.

"That because you don't quite know me yet. I've not the slightest
pleasure in putting on three different dresses a day. I do it very
often because it comes to me to do it, from the way in which we have
been taught to live. But when we get to Guestwick I mean to change
all that; and if you come in to tea, you'll see me in the same brown
frock that I wear in the morning,--unless, indeed, the morning work
makes the brown frock dirty. Oh, Dr Crofts! you'll have it pitch-dark
riding home under the Guestwick elms."

"I don't mind the dark," he said; and it seemed as though he hardly
intended to go even yet.

"But I do," said Bell, "and I shall ring for candles." But he stopped
her as she put her hand out to the bell-pull.

"Stop a moment, Bell. You need hardly have the candles before I go,
and you need not begrudge my staying either, seeing that I shall be
all alone at home."

"Begrudge your staying!"

"But, however, you shall begrudge it, or else make me very welcome."
He still held her by the wrist, which he had caught as he prevented
her from summoning the servant.

"What do you mean?" said she. "You know you are welcome to us as
flowers in May. You always were welcome; but now, when you have come
to us in our trouble-- At any rate, you shall never say that I turn
you out."

"Shall I never say so?" And still he held her by the wrist. He had
kept his chair throughout, but she was standing before him,--between
him and the fire. But she, though he held her in this way, thought
little of his words, or of his action. They had known each other with
great intimacy, and tho