the grass
near at hand, and he came running up.

"What you ringin' that door-bell for, doctor?" said he. "The folks ain't
come home yet. There ain't nobody there."

"Yes, there is, Jim. I was called here last night. A man came for me to
attend his wife. They must both have fallen asleep that the bell is not
answered. I wouldn't be surprised to find her dead, as a matter of fact.
She was a desperately sick woman. Perhaps she is dead and something has
happened to him. You have the key to the door, Jim. Let me in."

But the old man was shaking in every limb, and refused to do as he was
bid.

"Don't you never go in there, doctor," whispered he, with chattering
teeth. "Don't you go for to 'tend no one. You jus' come tell me when you
sent for that way. No, I ain't goin' in, doctor, nohow. It ain't part
of my duties to go in. That's been stipulated by Mr. Netherton. It's my
business to look after the garden."

Argument was useless. Dr. Block took the bunch of keys from the old
man's pocket and himself unlocked the front door and entered. He mounted
the steps and made his way to the upper room. There was no evidence of
occupancy. The place was silent, and, so far as living creature went,
vacant. The dust lay over everything. It covered the delicate damask of
the sofa where he had seen the dying woman. It rested on the pillows.
The place smelled musty and evil, as if it had not been used for a long
time. The lamps of the room held not a drop of oil.

But on the mantel-shelf was the prescription which the doctor had
written the night before. He read it, folded it, and put it in his
pocket.

As he locked the outside door the old gardener came running to him.

"Don't you never go up there again, will you?" he pleaded, "not unless
you see all the Nethertons home and I come for you myself. You won't,
doctor?"

"No," said the doctor.

When he told his wife she kissed him, and said:

"Next time when I tell you to stay at home, you must stay!"

THE PIANO NEXT DOOR

BABETTE had gone away for the summer; the furniture was in its summer
linens; the curtains were down, and Babette's husband, John Boyce, was
alone in the house. It was the first year of his marriage, and he missed
Babette. But then, as he often said to himself, he ought never to
have married her. He did it from pure selfishness, and because he was
determined to possess the most illusive, tantalizing, elegant, and
utterly unmoral little creature that t