“She's not a good servant in many respects,” admitted my mother, “but I think she's good-hearted.” “Oh, drat her heart,” was my aunt's retort. “The right place for that heart of hers is on the doorstep. And that's where I'd put it, and her and her box alongside it, if I had my way.” The departure of Susan did take place not long afterwards. It occurred one Saturday night. My mother came upstairs looking pale. “Luke,” she said, “do please run for the doctor.” “What's the matter?” asked my father. “Susan,” gasped my mother, “she's lying on the kitchen floor breathing in the strangest fashion and quite unable to speak.” “I'll go for Washburn,” said my father; “if I am quick I shall catch him at the dispensary.” Five minutes later my father came back panting, followed by the doctor. This was a big, black-bearded man; added to which he had the knack of looking bigger than even he really was. He came down the kitchen stairs two at a time, shaking the whole house. He brushed my mother aside, and bent over the unconscious Susan, who was on her back with her mouth wide open. Then he rose and looked at my father and mother, who were watching him with troubled faces; and then he opened his mouth, and there came from it a roar of laughter, the like of which sound I had never heard. The next moment he had seized a pail half full of water and had flung it over the woman. She opened her eyes and sat up. “Feeling better?” said the doctor, with the pail still in his hand; “have another dose?” Susan began to gather herself together with the evident intention of expressing her feelings; but before she could find the first word, he had pushed the three of us outside and slammed the door behind us. From the top of the stairs we could hear Susan's thick, rancorous voice raging fiercer and fiercer, drowned every now and then by the man's savage roar of laughter. And, when for want of breath she would flag for a moment, he would yell out encouragement to her, shouting: “Bravo! Go it, my beauty, give it tongue! Bark, bark! I love to hear you,” applauding her, clapping his hands and stamping his feet. “What a beast of a man,” said my mother. “He is really a most interesting man when you come to know him,” explained my father. Replied my mother, stiffly: “I don't ever mean to know him.” But it is only concerning the past that we possess knowledge. The riot from below ceased at length, and was followed by a new voice, speaking quietly and emphatically, and then we heard the doctor's step again upon the stairs. My mother held her purse open in her hand, and as the man entered the room she went forward to meet him. “How much do we owe you, Doctor?” said my mother. She spoke in a voice trembling with severity. He closed the purse and gently pushed it back towards her.