"But I don't mean to quarrel with you at all," she said, very sedately. "I mean to be friends; it is so much more convenient." Perhaps it was on the whole; even though as the years went on Dr. Thomas Kennedy, aged forty, began to wish that her twenty-first birthday would find her willing to continue the tie on another footing. And yet he recognised, not without a certain admiration, that she was not likely to be happy, even if married to one whom she trusted and liked as she trusted and liked him, unless she had first faced the world by herself. Of course, if she were to fall in love it would be different; then, like other women, she might take a certain pride in giving up her future. But she was scarcely likely to fall in love with him, unless he made love to her, and that was exactly what he could not do. In a sort of whimsical way he told himself it would not be fair, since in his heart of hearts he did not believe in the master passion! not, at least, in the romantic form in which alone it would appeal to a girl like Marjory. To affect her it must be something very intense indeed; something, in short, which his infinite tenderness for the girl prevented him from giving. Perhaps if there had been any symptoms of another lover appearing on the scene all this philosophic consideration might have disappeared under the pressure of rudimentary jealousy; but there were none. Indeed, barring the Episcopalian clergyman, who was quite out of the question, there was no young man of Marjory's own rank, or near it, at Gleneira, where he had arranged for her to stay on with a distant cousin of his own. And neither Will Cameron, the factor, nor old Mr. Wilson, at the Manse, nor any of the occasional visitors were more likely to stir the romantic side of the girl's nature than he was himself. Less likely, indeed, since he had the manifest charm of being a person of more importance. In appearance he was a small, dark man with a vivacious face and something of a foreign manner, the latter being due to his having wandered about on the Continent for years seeking surgical experience at the cannon's mouth. So, on his last visit to Gleneira, where he spent all his rare holidays, he had told himself point-blank that he of all men in the world was bound in honour not to take advantage of his ward's innocence and undisguised affection. She was exceptionally fitted for the future she had mapped out for herself, so in a way he was bound to let her try it. Consequently, as she sate that July afternoon teaching the children their duty to their neighbour, there was no _arrière pensée_ of any kind in her affectionate reliance on Cousin Tom's unfailing interest. That would last until she grew tired of teaching, and he grew old. Then, always supposing that it was agreeable to both parties, they might settle down somewhere and be the best of friends till death did them part.