ith me. There's time for a
magnificent hour before you have to put the kettle on. Miss Birch, I
wish we could take you, too. Next winter--well, that knee is doing so
well I dare to promise you all the skating you want."

Celia looked up at him, smiling, but her eyes were wistful.

"Doctor," cried Captain Rayburn, "telephone to the stables for a
comfortable old horse and sleigh, will you? Celia, girl, we'll go, too."

"And I'll look after Ellen," said Mrs. Fields, before anybody could
mention the baby. "Go on, all of you."

"May we all come back to supper with you?" asked Doctor Churchill,
giving her a glance with which she was familiar of old.

"If you'll send for some oysters I'll give you all hot stew," she said,
and received such a chorus of applause that she mentally added several
items to the treat.

"Now I can enjoy my fun," whispered Charlotte to Celia, as she brought
her sister's wraps, and pulled on her own rough brown coat. "Such a
jolly uncle, isn't he?"

"The best in the world. Wear your white tam, dear, and the white
mittens. They look so well with your brown suit. Tie the white silk
scarf about your neck--that's it. Now run. I'm so afraid somebody will
call the doctor out and spoil it all."

Charlotte ran, and found the doctor waiting impatiently, two pairs of
skates on his arm. He hurried her away down the street.

"We must get all there is of this," he said. "I feel as if I could skate
fifty miles and back again. Do you?"

"Indeed I do. I've wanted to get up and run round the block between
every two stitches all day."

"They say the river is good for three miles up. That will give us just
what we want--a sensation of running away from the earth and all its
cares. And when we get back we'll be ready for Fieldsy's stew."

They found everybody on the river; Charlotte was busy nodding to her
friends while the doctor put on her skates. In a few moments the two
were flying up the course.

"Oh, this is great!" exulted Doctor Churchill. "And this is the first
time you've been on the ice this winter--in February!"

"This is fine enough to make up. I do love it. It takes out all the
puckers."

"Doesn't it? I thought you'd been cultivating puckers to-day the minute
I saw you--or else I interpreted your mood by my own. Talk about
puckers--and nerves! Miss Charlotte, I've done my first big operation in
a certain line to-day. I mean, in a new line--an experiment. It was--a
success."

She looked up