dden past; and no past that is
hidden has ever been a happy past.

The Young Doctor took the bills, looked at them as though they were
curios, and then returned them with the remark that they were of a kind
and denomination of no use to him. There was a twinkle in his eye as he
said it. Then he added:

"I agree with you that it's a good thing for a man to lay up a little
credit of kindness here and there for his old age. Well, anything I did
for you was meant for kindness and nothing else. You weren't a bit of
trouble, and it was simply your good constitution and a warm room and a
few fly-blisters that pulled you through. It wasn't any skill of mine.
Go and thank my housekeeper if you like. She did it all."

"I did my best to thank her," answered Jean Jacques. "I said she
reminded me of Virginie Palass Poucette, and I could say nothing better
than that, except one thing; and I'm not saying that to anybody."

The Young Doctor had a thrill. Here was a very unusual man, with mystery
and tragedy, and yet something above both, in his eyes.

"Who was Virginie Palass Poucette?" he asked. Jean Jacques threw out a
hand as though to say, "Attend--here is a great thing," and he began,
"Virginie Poucette--ah, there...!"

Then he paused, for suddenly there spread out before him that past, now
so far away, in which he had lived--and died. Strange that when he had
mentioned Virginie's name to the housekeeper he had no such feeling as
possessed him now. It had been on the surface, and he had used her name
without any deep stir of the waters far down in his soul. But the Young
Doctor was fingering the doors of his inner life--all at once this
conviction came to him--and the past rushed upon him with all its
disarray and ignominy, its sorrow, joy, elation and loss. Not since he
had left the scene of his defeat, not since the farewell to his dead
Carmen, that sweet summer day when he had put the lovely, ruined being
away with her words, "Jean Jacques--ah, my beautiful Jean Jacques,"
ringing in his ears, had he ever told anyone his story. He had had a
feeling that, as Carmen had been restored to him without his crying out,
or vexing others with his sad history, so would Zoe also come back to
him. Patience and silence was his motto.

Yet how was it that here and now there came an overpowering feeling,
that he must tell this healer of sick bodies the story of an invalid
soul? This man with the piercing dark-blue eyes before him, who l