se; I'm trying
this one. I think of you often so I thought I'd drive out. How are you
making it, Kate?"

"Just fine, so far as the school goes. I don't particularly like the
woman I board with. Her son is some better, yes, he is much better.
And Robert, what is a Zonoletic Doctor?"

"A poor fool, too lazy to be a real doctor, with no conscience about
taking people's money for nothing," he said.

"As bad as THAT?" asked Kate.

"Worse! Why?" he said.

"Oh, I only wondered," said Kate. "Now I am ready, here; but I must
run to the house where I board a minute. It's only a step. You watch
where I go, and drive down."

She entered the house quietly and going back to the kitchen she said:
"The folks have come for me, Mrs. Holt. I don't know exactly when I
shall be back, but in plenty of time to start school. If George goes
before I return, tell him 'Merry Christmas,' for me."

"He'll be most disappointed to death," said Mrs. Holt.

"I don't see why he should," said Kate, calmly. "You never have had
the teacher here at Christmas."

"We never had a teacher that I wanted before," said Mrs. Holt; while
Kate turned to avoid seeing the woman's face as she perjured herself.
"You're like one of the family, George is crazy about you. He wrote me
to be sure to keep you. Couldn't you possibly stay over Sunday?"

"No, I couldn't," said Kate.

"Who came after you?" asked Mrs. Holt.

"Dr. Gray," answered Kate.

"That new doctor at Hartley? Why, be you an' him friends?"

Mrs. Holt had followed down the hall, eagerly waiting in the doorway.
Kate glanced at her and felt sudden pity. The woman was warped.
Everything in her life had gone wrong. Possibly she could not avoid
being the disagreeable person she was. Kate smiled at her.

"Worse than that," she said. "We be relations in a few days. He's
going to marry my sister Nancy Ellen next Tuesday."

Kate understood the indistinct gurgle she heard to be approving, so she
added: "He came after me early so I could go to Hartley and help get
their new house ready for them to live in after the ceremony."

"Did your father give them the house?" asked Mrs. Holt eagerly.

"No. Dr. Gray bought his home," said Kate.

"How nice! What did your father give them?"

Kate's patience was exhausted. "You'll have to wait until I come
back," she said. "I haven't the gift of telling about things before
they have happened."

Then she picked up her telescope and saying "good-