shown the receipt-slip. I was shown
the telegram from Eleanor. I was shown with a whoop the forget-me-nots!
Then he was going on Saturday? I asked. He said he guessed it would take
an earthquake to keep him away, and a pretty big earthquake, too!... Oh,
it was a great moment, and all the greater because I was tremendously
worked up, too. I saw Freddy floating before me, my sweet, girlish,
darling Freddy, holding out her arms ... while Jones gassed and gassed
and gassed....

I left him taking phenacetin for his headache.

III

The house-party had grown a little larger than was originally intended.
On Saturday night we sat down twelve to dinner. Doctor Jones and I
shared a room together, and I must say whatever misgivings I might have
had about him wore away very quickly on closer acquaintance. In the
first place he looked well in evening dress, carrying himself with a
sort of shy, kind air that became him immensely. At table he developed
the greatest of conversational gifts--that of the appreciative and
intelligent listener. I heard one of the guests asking Eleanor who was
that charming young man. Freddy and I hugged each other (I mean
metaphorically, of course) and gloried in his success. In the presence
of an admirer (such is the mystery of women) Eleanor instantly got
fifteen points better looking, and you wouldn't have known her for the
same girl. Freddy thought it was the two-hundred-and-fifty-dollar gown
she wore, but I could see it was deeper than that. She was thawing in
the sunshine of love, and I'll do Doctor Jones the justice to say that
he didn't hide his affection under a bushel. It was generous enough for
everybody to bask in, and in his pell-mell ardor he took us all to his
bosom. The women loved him for it, and entered into a tacit conspiracy
to gain him the right-of-way to wherever Eleanor was to be found. In
fact, he followed her about like a dog, and she could scarcely move
without stepping on him.

Sunday was even better. One of the housemaids drank some wood-alcohol by
mistake for vichy water, and the resulting uproar redounded to Jones'
coolness, skill and despatch. He dominated the situation and--well, I
won't describe it, this not being a medical work, and the reader
probably being a good guesser. Mrs. Matthewman remarked significantly
that it must be nice to be the wife of a medical man--one would always
have the safe feeling of a doctor at hand in case anything happened at
night! Eleanor