And yet, for her mind traveled back to her earlier talk by the tennis
court, Beaumaroy had a conscience, had feelings. He was fond of old Mr.
Saffron; he felt a responsibility for him, felt it, indeed, keenly. Or
was he, under all that seeming openness, a consummate hypocrite? Did he
value Mr. Saffron only as a milk cow, the doting giver of a large
salary? Was his only desire to humor him, keep him in good health and
temper, and use him to his own profit? A puzzling man, but, at all
events, cutting a poor figure beside Alec Naylor, about whom there could
circle no clouds of doubt. Doctor Mary's learning and gravity did not
prevent her from drawing a very heroic and rather romantic figure of
Captain Alec--notwithstanding that she sometimes found him rather hard
to talk to.

She felt Cynthia's arm steal around her waist, and Cynthia said softly,
"I did enjoy my afternoon. Can we go again soon, Mary?"

Mary glanced at her. Cynthia laughed and blushed. "Isn't he splendid?"
Cynthia murmured. "But I don't like Mr. Beaumaroy, do you?"

"I say yes to the first question, but I'm not quite ready to answer the
second," said Mary with a laugh.

Three days later, on Christmas Eve, one whom Jeanne, who caught sight of
him in the hall, described as being all there was possible of ugliness,
delivered (with a request for an immediate answer) the following note for
Mary Arkroyd:

DEAR DR. ARKROYD:

Mr. Saffron is unwell, and I have insisted that he must see a doctor. So
much he has yielded, after a fight! But nothing will induce him to see
Dr. Irechester again. On this point I tried to reason with him, but in
vain. He is obstinate and resolved. I am afraid that I am putting you in
a difficult and disagreeable position, but it seems to me that I have no
alternative but to ask you to call on him professionally. I hope that Dr.
Irechester will not be hurt by a whim which is, no doubt, itself merely a
symptom of disordered nerves, for Dr. Irechester has been most attentive
and very successful hitherto in dealing with the dear old gentleman. But
my first duty is to Mr. Saffron. If it will ease matters at all, pray
hold yourself at liberty to show this note to Dr. Irechester. May I beg
you to be kind enough to call at your earliest convenience, though it is,
alas, a rough evening to ask you to come out?

Yours very faithfully,

HECTOR BEAUMAROY.

"How very awkward!" exclaimed Mary. She had prided herself on a
rigorous abstention