“Good,” said Dr. Bannerman. “Then all we have to do is to find the key. I think I know a friend of yours whom we can consult about that. You shall hear the result of our conference very shortly. In the meanwhile, keep up your spirits and keep out of draughts, and English literature may yet thank your wife for taking you out of the army.” George shook his hand warmly, and the doctor left the house. Half way down Lockyer Street he met Ella Millard, who was burning with impatience to know the result of the interview. As he came up she hastily dismissed a fair-haired young fellow of three or four and twenty, who trotted meekly off at once towards the Hoe. She was too deeply interested in what the doctor had to tell to utter more than the word “Well!” in a tremulous voice. She thought, however, by the expression of his face that his news could not be very bad. “Well!” he repeated after her. “_Is_ it well?” said she impatiently. The doctor smiled. “I think so.” Her face softened. “I thought it could not be the worst; it would have been too dreadful--and too foolish,” she added sharply. “That is just what I told him. Oh! I was very hard with him; I thought he wanted it. He has had an awful time of it lately, and the poor boy hardly knows even yet whether he is on his head or his heels. But it is quite time now that he made an effort to pull himself together. I gave him a good talking to, I can tell you.” Her look seemed to implore mercy, but she said nothing. He continued: “They ought to go away. He thinks he could write, and I should encourage him to try.” “And--his wife?” she asked, with a scarcely perceptible diminution of interest. “There is nothing organically wrong with her at all. She will be herself again before him, and then help his recovery.” “_Help_ him! Do you think so?” asked Ella doubtfully. “Yes.” “I thought you told me, that when you first saw her she produced on you a very different impression.” “So she did. But then--she was a very different woman.” Ella’s mouth twitched rather scornfully. She thought that the weird prettiness of Nouna’s little wasted face had bewitched even this middle-aged doctor. “She is scarcely even yet an ideal companion for a man of intellect,” she said with a slight touch of her worst, most priggish manner. “H’m, I don’t know,” said the doctor. “Your man of intellect is generally a man of something else besides; and the housekeeper-wife and the blue-stocking wife both frequently leave as much to be desired as--well, say, the flower-wife, if once the flower learns to turn to the sun, as, I think, little Mrs. Lauriston has done.” “She is fond of him,” agreed Ella rather grudgingly. “And what more does he ask of her?” “Nothing more now; but will it be always so?” “Who can tell? But love on both sides is a good matrimonial foundation. Have they any money?” “Enough to live upon as quietly as they are doing now.”