The perspiration was standing under Maddy's hair by this time, and
when the doctor stepped across the threshold, and she knew he really
was coming near her, it oozed out upon her forehead in big, round
drops, while her cheeks glowed with a feverish heat. Thinking he
should get along with it better if he treated her just as he would
Jessie, the doctor confronted her at once, and asked: "How is my little patient to-day?"
A faint scream broke from Maddy's lips, and she involuntarily raised
her hands to thrust the stranger away. This black-eyed, black-haired,
thick-set man was not Dr. Holbrook, for he was taller, and more
slight, while she had not been deceived in the dark brown eyes which,
even while they seemed to be mocking her, had worn a strange
fascination for the maiden of fourteen and a half. The doctor fancied
her delirious again, and this reassured him at once. Dropping the
bouquet upon the bed, he clasped one of her hands in his, and without
the slightest idea that she comprehended him, said, soothingly: "Poor child, are you afraid of me--the doctor, Dr. Holbrook?" Maddy
did not try to withdraw her hand, but raising her eyes, swimming in
tears, to his face, she stammered out: "What does it mean, and where is he--the one who--asked me--those
dreadful questions? I thought that was Dr. Holbrook."
Here was a dilemma--something for which the doctor was not prepared,
and with a feeling that he would not betray Guy, he said: "No; that was some one else--a friend of mine--but I was there in the
back office. Don't you remember me? Please don't grow excited. Compose
yourself, and I will explain all by and by. This is wrong. 'Twill
never do," and talking thus rapidly he wiped away the sweat, about
which grandma had told him.
Maddy was disappointed, and it took her some time to rally
sufficiently to convince the doctor that she was not flighty, as he
termed it; but composing herself at last, she answered all his
questions, and then, as he saw her eyes wandering toward the bouquet,
he suddenly remembered that it was not yet presented, and placing it
in her hands, he said: "You like flowers, I know, and these are for you. I----"
"Oh! thank you, thank you, doctor; I am so glad. I love them so much,
and you are so kind. What made you think to bring them? I've wanted
flowers so badly; but I could not have them, because I was sick and
did not work in the garden. It was so good in you," and in her delight
Maddy's tears dropped upon the fair blossoms.