The Girl at Cobhurst. Frank Richard Stockton

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СКАЧАТЬ foreign parts would do just as well as you. And now put on your slippers, push the sofa up to the fire, and take your nap, and I'll go and see how the case really stands."

      The doctor smiled. "I have no more to say," said he. "There are angels who bless us by coming, and there are angels who bless us by going. You belong to both classes. But don't stay too long."

      "In any case I shall be back before dark," she said, and with a kiss on his forehead she left him.

      Dr. Tolbridge looked into the fire and considered.

      "Ought I to let her go?" he asked himself. This question, mingled with various thoughts and recollections of former experiences with Miss Panney, occupied the doctor's mind until he heard the swift rolling of the dog-cart wheels as they passed his window. Then he arose, put on his slippers, drew up the soft cushioned sofa, and lay down for a nap.

      In about half an hour he was aroused by the announcement that Miss

       Bannister had called to see him.

      Long practice in that sort of thing made him wake in an instant, and the young lady who was ushered into the study had no idea that she had disturbed the nap of a tired man. She was a very pretty girl, handsomely dressed; she had large blue eyes, and a very gentle and sweet expression, tinged, however, by an anxious sadness.

      "Who is sick, Miss Dora?" asked the doctor, quickly, as he shook hands with her.

      She did not seem to understand him. "Nobody," she said. "That is, I have come to see you about myself."

      "Oh," said he, "pray take a seat. I imagined from your face," he continued, with a smile, "that some one of your family was in desperate need of a doctor."

      "No," said she, "it is I. For a long time I have thought of consulting you, and to-day I felt I must come."

      "And what is the matter?" he asked.

      "Doctor," said she, a tear forcing itself into each of her beautiful eyes, "I believe I am losing my mind."

      "Indeed," said the doctor; "and how is your general health?"

      "Oh, that's all right," answered Miss Dora. "I do not think there is the least thing the matter with me that way. It is all my mind. It has been failing me for a good while."

      "How?" he asked. "What are the symptoms?"

      "Oh, there are ever so many of them," she said; "I can't think of them all. I have lost all interest in everything in this world. You remember how much interest I used to take in things?"

      "Indeed I do," said he.

      "The world is getting to be all a blank to me," she said; "everything is blank."

      "Your meals?" he asked.

      "No," she said. "Of course I must eat to live."

      "And sleep?"

      "Oh, I sleep well enough. Indeed, I wish I could sleep all the time, so that I could not know how the world—at least its pleasures and affections—are passing away from me. All this is dreadful, doctor, when you come to think of it. I have thought and thought and thought about it, until it has become perfectly plain to me that I am losing my mind."

      Dr. Tolbridge looked into the fire.

      "Well," said he, presently, "I am glad to hear it."

      Miss Dora sprang to her feet.

      "Oh, sit down," said he, "and let me explain myself. My advice is, if you lose your mind, don't mind the loss. It really will do you good. That sounds hard and cruel, doesn't it? But wait a bit. It often happens that the minds of young people are like their first teeth—what are called milk teeth, you know. These minds and these teeth do very well for a time, but after a while they become unable to perform the services which will be demanded of them, and they are shed, or at least they ought to be. Sometimes, of course, they have to be extracted."

      "Nonsense, doctor," said the young lady, smiling in spite of herself, "you cannot extract a mind."

      "Well, perhaps not exactly that," he answered, "but we can help it to be absorbed and to disappear, and so make a way for the strong, vigorous mind of maturity, which is certain to succeed it. All this has happened and is happening to you, Miss Dora. You have lost your milk mind, and the sooner it is gone the better. You will be delighted with the one that succeeds it. Now then, can you give me an idea about how angry you are?"

      "I am not angry at all," she replied, "but I feel humiliated. You think my mental sufferings are all fanciful."

      "Oh, no," said the doctor; "to continue the dental simile, they are the last aches of your youthful mentality, forced to make way for the intellect of a woman."

      Miss Bannister looked out of the window for a few moments.

      "Doctor," she then said, "I do not believe there is any one else who knows me, who would tell me that I have the mind of a child."

      "Oh, no," replied Dr. Tolbridge, "for it is not likely that there is any one else to whom you have made the fact known."

      There was a quick flush on the face of Miss Dora, and a flash in her blue eyes, and she reached out her hand toward her muff which lay on the table beside her, but she changed her purpose and drew back her hand. The doctor looked at her with a smile.

      "You were just on the point of jumping up and leaving the room without a word, weren't you?"

      "Yes, I was," said she, "and I have a great mind to do it now, but first I must—"

      "Miss Dora," said the doctor, "I am delighted. Actually you are cutting your new mind. Before you can realize the fact, you will have it all full-formed and ready for use. Let me see; this is the ninth of March; bad roads; bad weather; no walking; no driving; nothing inspiriting; disagreeable in doors and out. I think the full change will occur within three weeks. By the end of this month, you will not only have forgotten that your milk mind has troubled you, but that the world was ever blank, and that your joys and affections were ever on the point of passing away from you. You will then be the brave-hearted, bright-spirited woman that Nature intended you to be, after she had passed you through some of the preliminary stages."

      The flush on the face of Miss Dora gradually passed away as she listened to this speech.

      She rose. "Doctor," said she, "I like that better than what you have been saying. Anyway, I shall not be angry, and I shall wait three weeks and see what happens, and if everything is all wrong then, the responsibility will rest on you."

      "Very good," said he, "I agree to the terms. It is a bargain."

      Now Miss Dora seemed troubled again. She took up her muff, put it down, drew her furs about her, then let them fall again, and finally turned toward the physician, who had also risen.

      "Doctor," she said, "I don't want you to put this visit in the family bill. I wish to—to attend to it myself. How much should I pay you?" and she took out her little pocketbook.

      Dr. Tolbridge put his hands behind him.

      "This case is out of my usual line of practice," he said, "and my СКАЧАТЬ