"Does she say that to prevent my taking refuge in the parlor?" thought Miss Custer, and moved on and went outside. By and by some soft piano-strains came through the window, the sash of which was raised, at her back. When they ceased she became conscious, without turning her head to look through the shutters, that Mrs. Tascher had seated herself in an easy-chair and taken up a book from the centre-table, which held the usual stock of gilt-edged poems--Whittier's, Tennyson's, etc. Nearly an hour passed in sultry silence, broken only by the buzzing of flies and, now and then, a subdued sound of wheels on the sandy road below. At last the gate-latch clicked, and Ruth came in, walking slowly up the path. Doctor Ebling had driven by a few moments before, and gone up the alley to the stable, and just as Ruth reached the steps, shutting her parasol and smiling up rather wearily at Miss Custer, he came around the corner of the house, lifting his hat and wiping the perspiration from his face. "Why, where have you been?" Ruth asked in surprise. "In the country," said he. "And just think, Miss Stanley," exclaimed Miss Custer, speaking to Ruth, but looking a smiling reproach at the doctor, and for a moment forgetting the parlor occupant at her back, "here I have been sitting this whole blessed afternoon! I could have borne the infliction of my own solitary company better, of course, if I had not been promised an entertainment." "You must charge your disappointment to a poor fellow who got himself cut to pieces by a grass-mower," said the doctor. "Who was it?" asked Ruth quickly, with a sympathetic play of facial muscles. "A man by the name of Burgess, out east of town." "And is he in a bad way?" "Rather." Ruth stood for a moment with her eyes upon the ground, absorbed in the thought of a fellow-being in distress, and the doctor, glancing from her up to Miss Custer, was conscious of the strong contrast between them. Miss Custer was ten years Ruth's senior, but just now it looked as if it might be the other way: teaching gave Ruth a jaded look that seemed like age. But she was only eighteen. She wore a plain brown dress and linen cuffs and collar, all of which bore the stamp of the school-room. Her shoes were dusty, and her hair, untouched since early morning, had settled into a mass at the back of her neck, more artistic than stylish.