There was a peal of the bell just at that very moment, which was so shrill that it brought her to her feet in a second. “Our callers are coming early,” she thought as she went to look for the door opener, “but everything looks cosy even if we are not all settled.” “I am looking for Miss Marion Marlowe,” said a voice on the stairs as Marion stepped out into the hall. “I have been to her old address and they sent me here. I wonder, if I should find her, if she would be willing to see me?” Marion’s laugh rippled out merrily at this naive request, and she held out her hand cordially to her unexpected caller. “I am delighted to see you, Dr. Brookes,” she said, smiling, “but I am very sorry that both my friend and my sister are absent this evening. They would both have stayed at home if we had known you were coming.” “Oh, I am not so difficult to entertain as all that,” was the jolly answer. “One young lady at a time is enough, I find, Miss Marlowe. I am not so piggish as to want a dozen.” “They say there is safety in a multitude,” said Marion, slyly. “No danger of falling in love when there are plenty of them. It’s the monopoly of one that proves fatal, they tell me.” “So you think falling in love a fatality, do you?” asked the young man, quickly. “Well, if that is the case, I confess that I’m a fatalist.” “It has fatal consequences, I have discovered,” said Marion, half sadly, “although I must admit that I speak from observation and not experience.” “A confession that I am glad to hear you make, Miss Marlowe,” said her caller almost seriously; “for most of the women that men meet nowadays are either just recovering from some heart malady or at the actual crisis of the disease, or else, what is worse, they have so thoroughly recovered from some violent attack as to render them immune from ever having another.” “Poor things! I pity them,” said Marion, laughing, “but I can fancy that none of the three classes would afford very desirable companions. Still, we are all liable to infection of that kind,” she added, as she offered him a chair, “and up to the present time no one has produced a preventive.” “No, nor an antidote,” was the answer, in the same serious voice, “but now tell me, Miss Marlowe, about your plans for the future.” He spoke with so much sympathetic interest that Marion did not dream of resenting it; rather, it seemed most natural for her to sit there and tell him all about her plans. He was to be a physician and she a nurse. They had many hopes and aspirations in common. The evening passed so quickly that Marion was astonished when at ten o’clock the young man rose to leave her. “I shall arrange to come over to Charity often,” he said at parting. “I know several of the doctors there, so I can do so easily.” “I hope I shall like it,” said Marion, soberly. “It seems such a noble profession to be caring for the sick and suffering.”