"I see no change in the symptoms," cautiously. "We'll try the new prescription a few days, and we shall see--we shall see." Jane went back to her father and the models, and talked calmly of screws and pistons. If she could only take the shaking old gray head to her breast and cry her heart out! If she could lie down in the grave with him! They had been such friends all her life! He was the only friend she ever had. She got up and ran out of doors once or twice: her breath was leaving her: his face, with the strange change in it, drove her away. Outside, the ducks were wabbling in and out of the pond, the sun was shining, the chrysanthemums and crimson prince's feather were all in flower. Dave was currying a horse in the stable-yard and whistling a dancing tune. What a foolish fright she had been in! Everything in the world was going just as usual. When she went back, too, the captain was pulling out his patent scissors from a drawer, laughing, his face flushed. He never looked better in his life. She never left him after that. She had a couch made for herself at his door, that she might hear the moment that he stirred in the night. She could see no change in him from day to day, but she watched everybody keenly who came near him, trying to read their opinion of him in their faces. She fancied there was a difference in the manner of even Dave and Buff to him--a forced jocularity, a peculiar tenderness of voice. Bruno, she observed, had deserted her altogether and kept close to his master. It was at this time that Mr. Van Ness began to monopolize the house: the very air of it grew bland and decorous. He came early, and stayed until night. The captain treated him with reverential deference: Jane fell into the same habit. She was weak and suasible as a reed just now. She had lost all root and marrow out of her life. Every day her father dilated on Mr. Van Ness's virtues. She could not deny one of them. They began to fence her in as with smooth polished walls, with no breath inside. Bruno, alone inexorable, never allowed him to pass without a snap and growl, although he had yielded enough to the pressure of public opinion not to fly at his throat. "Mr. Van Ness, my dear," said the captain one day, "has been good enough to look into the affairs of the farm. He says the income from it should be trebled. Ask his advice, Jane. Especially as to turnips. We failed there. What intellectual scope that man has! It grasps a vast theory one moment and the minutest detail the next." "Yes, father." It mattered little to Jane who meddled with the farm now. "Mr. Van Ness"--the next day--"was glancing over your book-shelves this morning, Jane. A course of reading such as he would dictate would be of immeasurable benefit to you." "I know it," humbly. "I am shamefully ignorant." "Why not put yourself wholly into his care, Jenny?" taking her hand tenderly. "He is one of the best of men." "I believe he is," candidly.