“Can it be Sorrel and the square wagon?” Dr. Holbrook thought. But far different from Grandfather Clyde’s turnout was the stylish carriage and the spirited bays which the colored coachman stopped in front of the white cottage in the same yard with the office, the house where Dr. Holbrook boarded, and where, if he married while in Devonshire, he would most likely bring his wife. “Guy Remington, the very chap of all others whom I’d rather see, and, as I live, there’s Agnes with Jessie. Who knew _she_ was in these parts?” was the doctor’s mental exclamation, as, running his fingers through his hair and making a feint of pulling up the corners of his rather limp collar, he hurried out to the carriage, from which a dashing-looking lady of thirty, or thereabouts, was alighting. “Why, Agnes—I beg your pardon, Mrs. Remington—when did you come?” he asked, offering his hand to the lady, who, coquettishly shaking back from her pretty, dollish face a profusion of light brown curls, gave him the tips of her lavender kids, while she told him she had come to Aikenside the Saturday before; and hearing from Guy that the lady with whom he boarded was an old friend of hers, she had driven over to call, and brought Jessie with her. “Here, Jessie, speak to the doctor. He was poor dear papa’s friend,” and something which was intended as a sigh of regret for “poor, dear papa,” escaped Agnes Remington’s lips as she pushed a little curly-haired girl toward Dr. Holbrook. Mrs. Conner, the lady of the house, had seen them by this time, and came running down the walk to meet her distinguished visitor, wondering a little to what she was indebted for this call from one who, since her marriage with the aristocratic Dr. Remington, had somewhat ignored her former acquaintances. Agnes was delighted to see her, and as Guy declined entering the cottage just then, the two friends disappeared within the door, while the doctor and Guy repaired to the office, the latter sitting down in the chair intended for Madeline Clyde. This reminded the doctor of his perplexity, and also brought the comforting thought that Guy, who had never failed him yet, could surely offer some suggestions. But he would not speak of it just now, he had other matters to talk about; and so, jamming his pen-knife into a pine table covered with similar jams, he said, “Agnes, it seems, has come to Aikenside, notwithstanding she declared she never would, when she found that the whole of the Remington property belonged to your mother, and not your father.”