in
Moonstone, and once or twice during the winter the leading grocer got a
keg of them. They were used mainly for table decoration, about
Christmas-time. Thea had never had more than one grape at a time before.
When the doctor came back she was holding the almost transparent fruit
up in the sunlight, feeling the pale-green skins softly with the tips of
her fingers. She did not thank him; she only snapped her eyes at him in
a special way which he understood, and, when he gave her his hand, put
it quickly and shyly under her cheek, as if she were trying to do so
without knowing it--and without his knowing it.

Dr. Archie sat down in the rocking-chair. "And how's Thea feeling
to-day?"

He was quite as shy as his patient, especially when a third person
overheard his conversation. Big and handsome and superior to his fellow
townsmen as Dr. Archie was, he was seldom at his ease, and like Peter
Kronborg he often dodged behind a professional manner. There was
sometimes a contraction of embarrassment and self consciousness all over
his big body, which made him awkward--likely to stumble, to kick up
rugs, or to knock over chairs. If any one was very sick, he forgot
himself, but he had a clumsy touch in convalescent gossip.

Thea curled up on her side and looked at him with pleasure. "All right.
I like to be sick. I have more fun then than other times."

"How's that?"

"I don't have to go to school, and I don't have to practice. I can read
all I want to, and have good things,"--she patted the grapes. "I had
lots of fun that time I mashed my finger and you wouldn't let Professor
Wunsch make me practice. Only I had to do left hand, even then. I think
that was mean."

The doctor took her hand and examined the forefinger, where the nail had
grown back a little crooked. "You mustn't trim it down close at the
corner there, and then it will grow straight. You won't want it crooked
when you're a big girl and wear rings and have sweethearts."

She made a mocking little face at him and looked at his new scarf-pin.
"That's the prettiest one you ev-ER had. I wish you'd stay a long while
and let me look at it. What is it?"

Dr. Archie laughed. "It's an opal. Spanish Johnny brought it up for me
from Chihuahua in his shoe. I had it set in Denver, and I wore it to-day
for your benefit."

Thea had a curious passion for jewelry. She wanted every shining stone
she saw, and in summer she was always going off into the sand hills to
hunt f