The uncertain light favoured her well, or Dr. Harrison would have seen too much of her face-play. They had been going on and on, and the doctor had been as usual talking, and she had managed now and then to seem to give an answer--she never remembered to what; and her part in the conversation all along had been so modestly small that the doctor hardly knew when or whether she had ceased to comprehend him. But they emerged at last upon the lawn, where Faith was taken possession of and marched off by the old Judge, nothing loth. The doctor casting about for another fish to throw his line at, spied Reuben Taylor, standing alone, and eying as Mr. Linden and Faith had done the gay scene about the house, now gay with the many-coloured lamps. "Well, my man," said the doctor easily accosting him as he stood there, "you did very well this afternoon. How long have you been at the school?" Reuben made answer with his usual respectful courtesy. "Are you a friend of Miss Derrick's?" "I think Miss Derrick is my friend, sir," said Reuben with a little flush. "Is she?" said the doctor. "Well don't you think that comes to the same thing?" "No sir." "No? What's the difference? I'm not examining you now--I am asking for information." "I think you must know, sir," said Reuben, respectfully but firmly, after a glance at his questioner. "Do you?" said the doctor laughing slightly. "Well, if you are not her friend, it don't signify. I was going to remark to you, if you _were_, that ladies don't generally care to have their private affairs talked about, and however much you may know, it is not always worth while to tell it." "I neither know nor have said anything, Dr. Harrison," said Reuben, drawing himself up a little, and looking full in the doctor's face. "You're Reuben Taylor, aren't you?" "Yes sir--I'm not anybody else though." "No," said the doctor carelessly. "Well, it isn't necessary you should be, for present purposes. I heard you quoted as authority just now, on something which touched that lady's affairs, whose friend you say you are not--and I think, _your_ friend though she may be, she was not particularly gratified with your interference." "Miss Faith knew it was a wrong quotation," said Reuben quietly. "You are sure of that?" "Quite sure, sir--if it was anything about her which ought not to have said." "Don't know that it was," said the doctor; "it's well enough sometimes to set people right when they are wrong--what I say is, that ladies don't always thank one for it." Reuben flushed a little. "You don't know me, Dr. Harrison," he said--"I can't expect you to take my word; but I have nothing to add to it." "And I have nothing to add to mine," said the doctor lightly. "I heard you quoted--that's all; I supposed you would know what for." "Who did you hear, sir?" "Don't know, really," said the doctor--"only he was a rude fellow--if you can tell one by such a description among your mates, it was he." And the doctor strolled away.