arlow behind him. Oscar come back, Inna
crying over it. Well, with the coming of the two doctors she soon dried
her eyes and inquired for her kitten.

"Kitten, dear?" Mrs. Grant thought there was something a little wrong
with her head still, just a cobweb not cleared away, because of her
crying so, you know. Not so the doctor, for there came a piteous
prolonged mew, and up scrambled the kitten, inside one of the legs of
the doctor's trousers. She had missed her way, you see, but had chosen a
friend next best to Inna.

"Well, you're no beauty," quoth the doctor, drawing her down from her
hiding-place, and holding her on his arm to stroke her; "and you're
nothing to cry over, lost or found."

Dr. Willett put her into Inna's arms, where the little thing nestled,
as if she knew her rightful place already.

"I didn't cry over the kitten, uncle; I cried over Oscar," said the
little girl.

Mr. Barlow had drawn Oscar from the room and himself stayed with him, to
keep him there.

"Where is Oscar?--it isn't a dream, is it?" and Inna's eyes swept the
room.

"Dream? no, my dear; he was here just now. Isn't it his rightful place?"
spoke the doctor drily.

"Yes, only--only----"

"Ah! yes, only you want to know where he has been, what he has been
doing, and what right he had to come back in this matter-of-fact way,
when you had been imagining all sorts of unlikely things about him; and
so you cried over it, to give the whole thing the girl-like touch it
lacked. Ha--ha!"

This was Mr. Barlow's speech, putting his head in at the kitchen door,
to see how they were getting on.

"Yes, come in, both of you," said the doctor, that sorrowful gravity
lifted from his face already.

"Well, my boy, you have taken a heavy weight from my heart and added
years to my life by coming back," was what he said, drawing the lad to
him, and laying his hand on his shoulder.

"Have you missed me so much, uncle?" asked Oscar.

"Missed!" A look passed over Dr. Willett's face, which Inna, watching,
thought very like that on her father's face when he kissed her
"Good-bye," before she came down to the farm.

"Missed you, Master Oscar! yes, we're all missed, even when 'tis a boy
we're keeping the farm for," was Mrs. Grant's unlooked-for remark.

"Very silly of Mrs. Grant, to bring up that question of the farm on the
first night of the boy's return," observed the doctor, when he and his
friend were sipping their coffee together, the young folk