ds. That Loo is a thorough-pacer,--after my own
heart.--Talking of your family, my dear," as Grey opened the door. "Loo
will do better for them than you. Pardon me, but a lot of selfish men in a
family need to be treated like Pen here, when his stomach is sour. Give
them a little wholesome alkali: honey won't answer."

Grey only laughed. Some day, she thought, when her father had completed
his survey of the coal-formation, and Joseph had induced Congress to stop
the war, people would appreciate them. So she took off Mrs. Sheppard's
furs and bonnet, and smoothed the two black shiny puffs of hair, passing
her husband with only a smile, as a stranger was there, but his
dressing-gown and slippers waited by the fire.

"Paul may be at home before you," she said, nodding to them.

Grey had dropped easily through that indefinable change between a young
girl and a married woman: her step was firmer, her smile freer, her head
more quietly poised. Some other change, too, in her look, showed that her
affections had grown truer and wider of range than before. Meaner women's
hearts contract after marriage about their husband and children, like an
India-rubber ball thrown into the fire. Hers would enter into his nature
as a widening and strengthening power. Whatever deficiency there might be
in her brain, she would infuse energy into his care for people about
him,--into his sympathy for his patients; in a year or two you might be
sure he would think less of Paul Blecker _per se_, and hate or love fewer
men for their opinions than he did before.

The supper, a solid meal always in these houses, was brought in. Grey took
her place with a blush and a little conscious smile, to which Mrs.
Sheppard called Doctor Blecker's attention by a pursing of her lips, and
then, tucking her napkin under her chin, prepared to do justice to venison
and biscuits. She sipped her coffee with an approving nod, dear to a young
housekeeper's soul.

"Good! Grey begins sound, at the foundations, in cooking, Doctor. No
shams, child. Don't tolerate them in housekeeping. If not white sugar,
then no cake. If not silver, then not albata. So you're coming with me to
New York, my dear?"

Grey's face flushed.

"Paul says we will go."

"Sister there? Teaching, did you say?"

Doctor Blecker's moustache worked nervously. Lizzy Gurney was not of his
kind; now, more than ever, he would have cut every tie between her and
Grey, if he could. But his wife looked up wi