nxieties about
his future victuals and drink."

CHAPTER XLII

AN INTERVIEWER

The roan mare travelled well that morning, and Miss Panney was at
Cobhurst before the doctor reached his patient's house. To her regret
she found that Mrs. Drane and Miriam had driven to Thorbury. Miss
Drane was upstairs at her work, and Mr. Haverley was somewhere on the
place, but could easily be found. All this she learned from Mike, whom
she saw outside.

"And where is the cook?"

"She's in the kitchen," said Mike.

"A good place for her," replied the old lady; "let her stay there. I will
see Mr. Haverley, and I will see him out here. Go and find him and tell
him I am sitting under that tree."

Ralph arrived, bright-eyed.

"Well, sir," cried the old lady, "and so you have decided to take a wife
to yourself, eh?"

"Indeed I have," said he, with the air of one who had conquered a
continent, and giving Miss Panney's outstretched hand a hearty shake.

"Sit down here," said she, "and tell me all about it. I suppose your soul
is hungering for congratulations."

"Oh yes," he said, laughing; "they are the collateral delights which are
next best to the main happiness."

"Now," said Miss Panney, "I suppose you feel quite certain that Miss
Drane is a young woman who will suit your temperament and your general
intellectual needs?"

"Indeed I do," cried Ralph. "She suits me in every possible way."

"And you have thoroughly investigated her character, and know that she
has the well-balanced mind which will be very much wanted here, and that
she has cut off and swept away all remnants of former attachments to
other young men?"

Ralph twisted himself around impatiently.

"One moment," said Miss Panney, raising her hand. "And you are quite
positive that she would have been willing to marry you if you had not
owned this big farm; and that if you had had a dozen other girls to
choose from, you still would have chosen her; and that you really think
such a small person will appear well by the side of a tall fellow like
you; and you are entirely convinced that you will never look around on
other men's wives and wish that your wife was more like this one or that
one; and that--"

"Miss Panney!" cried Ralph, "do you suppose there was ever a man in the
world who thought about all those things when he really loved a woman?"

"No," said she, "I do not suppose there ever was one, and it was in the
hope that such a one had at last appea