our skill would be thrown away,--I
am never ill."

"Apparently there is no reason why you should be, with common-sense to
back your blessings. If common-sense could be bought at the drug-store,
I should be rid of a great many patients."

"That reminds me of a snatch of conversation I once overheard between
my mother and a doctor's wife. I am reminded of it because the spirit
of your meaning is diametrically opposed to her own. After some talk my
mother asked, 'And how is the doctor?' 'Oh,' replied the visitor, with
a long sigh, 'he's well enough in body, but he's blue, terribly blue;
everybody is so well, you know.'"

"Her sentiment was more human than humane," laughed Kemp. He was glad to
see that she had roused herself from her sad musings; but a certain set
purpose he had formed robbed him now of his former lightness of manner.

He was about to broach a subject that required delicate handling; but an
intuitive knowledge of the womanly character of the young girl aided
him much. It was not so much what he had seen her do as what he knew she
was, that led him to begin his recital.

"We have a good many blocks before us yet," he said, "and I am going to
tell you a little story. Why don't you take the full benefit of my arm?
There," he proceeded, drawing her hand farther through his arm, "now
you feel more like a big girl than like a bit of thistledown. If I get
tiresome, just call 'time,' will you?"

"All right," she laughed. She was beginning to meet halfway this
matter-of-fact, unadorned, friendly manner of his; and when she did meet
it, she felt a comfortable security in it. From the beginning to the end
of his short narrative he looked straight ahead.

"How shall I begin? Do you like fairy tales? Well, this is the soul of
one without the fictional wings. Once upon a time,--I think that is the
very best introduction extant,--a woman was left a widow with one little
girl. She lived in New Orleans, where the blow of her husband's death
and the loss of her good fortune came almost simultaneously. She must
have had little moral courage, for as soon as she could, she left her
home, not being able to bear the inevitable falling off of friends
that follows loss of fortune. She wandered over the intermediate States
between here and Louisiana, stopping nowhere long, but endeavoring to
keep together the bodies and souls of herself and child by teaching.
They kept this up for years until the mother succumbed. They were o