"St. Luke's, eh? That's where you heard of this old curmudgeon." "Yes, there; and from Delia Beaseley, and Jamie, and Mrs. Macleod." "By the way, you and Jamie seem to be great friends." "I love him," I said emphatically. "H'm, lucky dog; better not tell him so." "Why not?" I asked, at once on the defensive. The Doctor compressed his lips in a fashion that said as plainly as if he had spoken, "Unsophisticated at twenty-six; I don't believe her!" "I love Cale, too, and he is my own kind." "Cale 's all right; I 'm going to know him better before the week is out. And how about Mrs. Macleod?" "Mrs. Macleod is Jamie's mother, and I like her and respect her--but she 's not easy to love." "That's true--she is not easy to love. About the salary," he said changing the subject; "I intended to pay it myself until you were installed on the farm; it is a favor to me to be allowed to help out Mrs. Macleod. I knew from private sources that she needed someone to cheer her here in this Canadian country; it's a great change from her home in Crieff, and then she carries Jamie on her heart all the time. I insisted this morning on taking charge of the whole business, you included," he smiled ruefully, "but Ewart would n't hear to it. He argues that so long as you are in his house, and your work is--well, we 'll call it home-making, he, being the beneficiary has the sole right to pay for his benefits." "That's just what I told Mrs. Macleod and Jamie I would try to make of you and him--" "The dickens you did! A beneficiary of me, eh?" "Yes, and I shall try to," I said earnestly. The Doctor grew serious at once. "It will not be a hard task, Miss Farrell; I begin to dream of what the farm will be like with you to help make it a home for me and, in time, many others, as I hope." "Doctor Rugvie, would you mind calling me by my first name?" "Yes, I should mind very much, because it's exactly what I have wanted to do, but did not feel at liberty to." "In my position it is better that all in the house should call me Marcia." "Your position?" He looked around at me with a queer twist of his upper lip. "What is your position?" "According to the advertisement it was for service on a farm in Canada." "And now you find yourself in an anomalous one? Is that the trouble?" "Yes, just it. I don't know what is to be required of me--I really don't see how I am to earn my salt." "Don't bother yourself about that." He frowned slightly. "I confess this insistence on Ewart's part to pay you, complicates matters a little. _I_ wanted to be boss this time." "And I hoped you would be mine, anyway," I said mutinously. "I am far from satisfied to have my business dealings with Mr. Ewart, a stranger and an alien." "It will be only for a time; I am going to tell you, all of you, about my farm plans this evening. I have n't spoken yet to Ewart very freely about them."