“We are too late!” exclaimed Dick, with ever so much disgust and dissatisfaction evident in his tones. “Why so?” “There’s Dr. Bilks. He has got here before me. I didn’t think he would take Mary with him to visit a patient. I am sorry I waited a moment in Summerville.” “What difference can that make? The doctor will point out to you the house in which his patient lives,” laughed Eugene. “I dare say he can by this time. I suppose Dr. Bilks has declared war upon me now, if he did not before.” “I should not suppose he would love you, after the scorching you gave him on the stand.” By this time the chaise was within a few rods of the buggy, and Engene turned out of the road to let it pass; but Dr. Bilks drew up his horse, and came to a dead halt within talking distance of the two gentlemen. “How are you again?” said the doctor, in his usual easy, good-natured tones, and apparently not at all disturbed by the events which had transpired in the court-room. “If you are not in a hurry, I want to tell you a story,” continued Dr. Bilks, chuckling, as though he had something “rich” to relate; and, without waiting to learn whether the gentlemen were in a hurry or not, he proceeded: “A rather miserly man, out in Columbus, Ohio, where I came from, who was worth his hundred thousand, at least, was seen, one day, searching very diligently on the plank sidewalk, in one of the streets. The search was continued so long that the attention of the people was attracted, and some one asked him what he was looking for. After some hesitation he replied that he was looking for a cent he had lost. Of course the bystanders laughed heartily at the idea of a man worth a hundred thousand dollars searching half an hour or more for a single miserable copper. ‘O! it isn’t so much the cent I want,’ added the man, stung by the laugh, ‘but I wanted to know where the derned thing had gone to.’” Eugene was polite enough to laugh at the story, but he was impatient for the application. “Mr. Birch,” continued the doctor, blandly, “you rather had me on the hip this morning. Now, it isn’t so much the baby that I care for; but I wanted to know where the ‘derned’ thing was. In a word, Mr. Birch, I came down here to find that baby.” “As you seem to be remarkably good natured about it, I suppose you found it,” replied Dick, rather coldly. “On the contrary, I did not. It seems the poor baby died, and the mother has gone away.” “Gone away?” exclaimed Dick. “Why, the child was born only night before last!” “Bless me, I have known a woman to do her washing the day after,” laughed the doctor. “Out in Columbus, Ohio, where I came from, I knew an Irish woman who started for Cincinnati about two hours afterwards, and carried her baby with her. That isn’t the rule with our people, though it happens so sometimes.” Mary, who sat by the doctor’s side, did not relish this conversation, and she turned away her head. “Of course you found the house, doctor,” added Dick.