On one side of the house lay the broad white public road, from which one deviated to approach this earthly paradise; on the other, a narrower private one, a mere cart track, grass-grown, cool, and shady, leading down to the mill stream that ran behind the grounds, brawling and seething and swelled by the spring rains into quite a respectable torrent. Down this path Dora always took me to walk when she wanted me to say anything uncommonly foolish, which could serve her as food for laughter, and down this path again we must always go when that villain Hayes was of the party, and she wanted to play me off against him, or him against me, or both against her womanly vanities. Accordingly I found them equipped for a walk, loitering on the front piazza, not waiting for me, however, as Dora took pains to explain, and as I could readily believe, for they were flirting over a new song. Not in the best of humor, I took the offered seat near them, wiped my heated brows, and advised my fair cousin not to saunter through the damp woodland paths on this most unhealthy morning. 'I advise you as a physician, mind you,' said I, to give weight to the opinion which might be denied it in my cousinly capacity; but she received it with utter contempt and ridicule of my pretensions, gladly joined by Mr. Hayes, whose white teeth gleamed wolfishly behind a long black mustache, at my expense. We had shaken hands with great cordiality; I had inquired after his clients, he had professed interest in my patients; I had asked him how he had enjoyed the ride with Miss Julia Stevens last evening, and he had just remembered seeing me, as he drove past Mrs. Hedge's in the front garden with Anna Hedge; a reminiscence which went a thought too far, for I had been, at the time of which he spoke, seated on this very piazza beside the innocent young lady opposite, who now showed no tokens of the sweet confusion, with which she listened to my broken confidence last night, and only glanced from one to the other with guileless interest and wondering simplicity. Now I had said enough to her on that occasion to make me feel some anxiety concerning her demeanor to-day, and some resolution concerning my own. I had a right to expect, after the way in which she then treated me, that if _my_ cheeks burned and my ears tingled, and my heart beat faster, at the remembrance of that sweet meeting, hers would at least betray some consciousness of the fact. But not a fleeting tremor shook her little hand, not a shade of color deepened the rose of her round cheek, not a passing emotion of bashfulness weighed down her curly eyelashes. She was serenely self-possessed, superbly cool, and attentive to the obnoxious Hayes, in proportion as she was disregardful of me.