"But that’s all shove be’ind me Long ago and fur away." RUDYARD KIPLING. The boys had been back at school a fortnight. Jane-Anne was quite convalescent and got up to breakfast, but the date of her return to the Bainbridge was still undecided. The doctor came at longer intervals, but every time he came he still declared that there was "a roughness" in Jane-Anne’s lung, and that it would be madness to send her North until that roughness was smoothed away. Night and morning and many times during the day, Jane-Anne bombarded heaven with petitions that "the roughness" might perhaps increase a very little, since it gave her no inconvenience whatever; anyway, that it might remain sufficiently rasping to confirm the doctor in his view that her return to the Bainbridge was at present out of the question. Mrs. Dew, although properly respectful to the doctor as a friend of Mrs. Methuen, yet felt that in this case he pushed professional caution to the verge of the ridiculous. Here was Jane-Anne eating and sleeping as well as could be, with pinker and plumper cheeks than she had had for many a long day, looking, in fact, as her aunt said, "the picture of health," though some people might have thought the picture rather elusive and misleading; here was Jane-Anne eating the bread of idleness with almost aggressive satisfaction in Holywell when she ought to have been reaping the benefits of her "nomination" up in Northumberland. Why all this fuss about a slight roughness? "Mark my words and anyone can ’ear anything as he listens for," said Mrs. Dew. Finally, Mr. Wycherly interviewed the doctor, who said to him in plain words what he had feared to say to the child’s aunt. The doctor was an outspoken young man of sporting tendencies. He wore a white hat rather on one side and drove an uncommonly good horse, and to Mr. Wycherly he said: "It’s like setting a thoroughbred filly to pull a cart-load of bricks to expect that child to do housework in her present state. She ought to do nothing for three months, and even then I should say she is singularly unfitted for the kind of life she has up there. I know those schools—excellent for big strong girls; but that child isn’t strong. She’s all nerves and brains and empty, craving heart. The lung trouble isn’t serious if it’s checked in time, but if she goes back she’ll get overtired and catch cold again directly. I’m sorry for her aunt, but what can I say? I won’t be responsible for sending her back." The doctor spoke angrily. He hated interfering in other people’s business and he thought it exceedingly probable that an old gentleman living by himself might strongly object to having a girl child foisted upon him for an indefinite period. "It seems to me," said Mr. Wycherly mildly, "that it would be criminal stupidity to allow her to go back." The doctor looked rather astonished. "But what’s to become of the child?" he asked.