“Remain here, dear Emolyn, where you will be entirely free from interruption, while I go and find my old friend and break to him the news of your visit—indeed of your existence, which will seem to him like a resurrection from the dead,” added the doctor, as he pressed her hand and left the room. The lady sat back in her chair, trying to gain courage for the dreaded interview. And with the strange double consciousness which we have all at times experienced, while bending all her powers of mind to prepare for the approaching ordeal, she also observed the smallest detail in the dingy little corner nook in which she waited—the faded green carpet and curtains, the old walnut table and chairs, the quaint old-fashioned escritoire, half bureau as to its lower division, and half bookcase as to its upper, whose shelves, seen through the glass doors, displayed a queer collection of old, moldy folios. Meanwhile Dr. Willet went on to the handsome and well-appointed library where Commodore Bruce usually passed his days in reading, writing, smoking and dozing. He found the old sailor, wrapped in his wadded silk dressing-gown and reclining back in his luxurious easy-chair, engaged in looking over a newspaper that had just been brought to him by his mail messenger. “Ah, doctor! Back so soon? I am glad of it! There is nothing at all worth reading in the papers nowadays, and I feel as dull as a ship becalmed at sea! Well, how is your patient, sir?” demanded the old sailor. Then without waiting for reply, he burst out with: “It is disgusting to think you left your practice in the city and came here for a good rest——” “I came here for the pleasure of your company, my dear friend, and for nothing else under the sun!” interrupted the doctor. “Well, then, you came here for the pleasure of my company, which, by the by, is a very great and undeserved compliment to my powers of entertaining. But let that pass. You came for my company, and the rest, you know, is thrown in. But instead of a rest, you have found a free patient, whose condition requires you to ride about twelve miles a day—counting both ways!” “No more exercise than is required for my own health. Besides, I take an interest in the old woman. She is a very old acquaintance of mine, and in former days was often my co-laborer, being a professional sick-nurse,” said the doctor. “Well, well, as you please, but I think it would be pleasanter now for you to take an occasional ride behind the hounds with my nephew instead of that dreary daily sick call! However, be it as you will; only I hope the old crone will get well or go to heaven before long. Is she likely to do either?”