"Oh, la! yes," Aunt Ruby answered--"for more'n a year. The way of it was: Ruth's guardian, Mr. Murray, who was a minister, went off to some forrin country several years ago to be a missionary, and left Ruth here to finish her education. He was to send for her to come an' teach in a mission-school if she wanted to go--an' she al'ays said she did--after she'd graduated in the normal. But she came up here to stay a spell after graduatin', an' met Doctor Ebling; an' they took a notice to each other right away, an' were engaged. She wrote to Mr. Murray about it, an' he gave his consent to the marriage. But it couldn't take place just yet, for the doctor had only just begun his practice an' wasn't ready to settle down." "That is, I suppose, he had not sufficient means to set up housekeeping?" said Miss Custer, smiling. "Well, perhaps not in the way he'd like," Aunt Ruby returned evasively, not being a gossip in the mischievous sense. "And your other gentleman-boarder, Mr. Bruce--" began Miss Custer, and then stopped. "Oh, he's got enough money to set up housekeeping like a king," said Aunt Ruby, feeling that this was safe ground. "If he had anybody to set up with him," she added, and laughed at her own wit. "But did Miss Stanley really think of going to teach in a foreign mission-school?" Miss Custer asked. "To be sure she did," said Aunt Ruby. "She's a Christian girl, if ever there was one. You might look the world over, Miss Custer, an' you'd hardly find another girl like Ruth Stanley. She's the same as a missionary right here at home, because she looks out for every poor an' sick body in the town, an' spends half her wages to help them." "Just the sort of person, then, for a doctor's wife," laughed Miss Custer, and gathered up her embroidery to go back to the veranda. Instead of going through the dining-room, the way she had entered, she crossed over to the door of the back sitting-room, which was ajar, and pushed it open. She started and her cheeks crimsoned, at the recollection of her conversation with Aunt Ruby, on finding the sitting-room occupied. Mrs. Tascher sat in Aunt Ruby's great arm-chair, with its calico cushions, looking over some fashion-plates in the carelessly-indolent way that very warm weather induces. She had some pieces of muslin and a pair of scissors beside her on the table, as though she had been cutting out. She looked up with a smile that was intended simply as an expression of politeness, and not such a smile as she would give a friend, and nodded: "Good-afternoon, Miss Custer." Miss Custer, feeling herself compromised by having been caught gossiping--and by Mrs. Tascher, of all people!--fortified herself by a little accession of pride in her usually suave demeanor. "Good-afternoon," she returned, passing on through the room. "How stiflingly warm it is here!" "Yes. I have been thinking of going into the parlor," said Mrs. Tascher: "it is always cool there, because the blinds are kept closed."