"MADELINE A. CLYDE.
"P. S.--For particular reasons I hope you can attend to me as early as
Monday. M. A. C."
Dr. Holbrook knew very little of girls, but he thought this note, with
its P. S., decidedly girlish. Still he made no comment, either verbal
or mental, so flurried was he with knowing that the evil he so much
dreaded had come upon him at last. Had it been left to his choice, he
would far rather have extracted every one of that maiden's teeth, than
to have set himself up before her like some horrid ogre, asking what
she knew. But the choice was not his, and, turning to the boy, he
said, laconically, "Tell her to come."
Most men would have sought for a glimpse of the face under the bonnet
tied with blue, but Dr. Holbrook did not care a picayune whether it
were ugly or fair, though it did strike him that the voice was
singularly sweet, which, after the boy had delivered his message, said
to the old man, "Now, grandpa, we'll go home. I know you must be
tired."
Slowly Sorrel trotted down the street, the blue ribbons fluttering in
the wind, while one little ungloved hand was seen carefully adjusting
about the old man's shoulders the ancient camlet cloak which had done
duty for many a year, and was needed on this chill April day. The
doctor saw all this, and the impression left upon his mind was, that
Candidate No. 1 was probably a nice-ish kind of a girl, and very good
to her grandfather. But what should he ask her, and how demean himself
toward her? Monday afternoon was frightfully near, he thought, as this
was only Saturday; and then, feeling that he must be ready, he brought
out from the trunk, where, since his arrival in Devonshire, they had
bean quietly lying, books enough to have frightened an older person
than poor little Madeline Clyde, riding slowly home with grandpa, and
wishing so much that she'd had a glimpse of Dr. Holbrook, so as to
know what he was like, and hoping he would give her a chance to repeat
some of the many pages of geography and "Parley's History," which she
knew by heart. How she would have trembled could she have seen the
formidable volumes heaped upon his table and waiting for her. There
were French and Latin grammars, "Hamilton's Metaphysics," "Olmstead's
Philosophy," "Day's Algebra," "Butler's Analogy," and many others,
into which poor Madeline had never so much as looked. Arranging them
in a row, and half wishing himself back again to the days when he had
studied them, the doctor went out to visit his patients, of which
there were so many that Madeline Clyde entirely escaped his mind, nor
did she trouble him again until the dreaded Monday came, and the hands
of his watch pointed to two.