"Papa, how unkind!" said Marion, flushing to the roots of her hair; "I don't know as Mr. Thornton ever picked up my handkerchief in his life, and he wouldn't be so foolish as to consider it an honor if he had."
"No?" replied her father, in the most provoking way; "but there,—you shan't be teased any more! Just turn round, and smile sweetly on the doctor, and tell him you don't think he's too old to come to your party, and you'll let him, if he'll promise to be a good boy."
"I don't care whether he comes or not," cried Marion, struggling to get away from her father.
"If that is the case," said Dr. Drayton, "I shall certainly come, simply for my own amusement. I didn't know but my presence might be particularly disagreeable to you; but as you seem so thoroughly indifferent, I shall come, and look on with the other old folks."
Marion bit her lips, and said nothing; but as her father still held her hand, so that she could not get away, she seated herself on the arm of his chair with her face turned towards the fire.
"Doctor," said Mr. Berkley, "why don't you shave off that beard? It makes you look five years older than you are."
"That is my mask," replied the doctor, stroking his beard with his right hand; "I could not part with it."
"What, in the name of sense, do you want of a mask?"
"Unluckily for me, my mouth is the telltale feature of my face. I found, when I first became a surgeon, that my patients could tell by its expression whether they were to live or die; so I covered it up with this beard. After I had been at the hospital several years, and had seen sights that the very telling of them would make you shudder; when I performed operation after operation without flinching, or even having the slightest feeling of repugnance, I thought I must have got my mouth under perfect control, and so ventured to trim my mustache and shave my beard. That very morning I had to attend a poor fellow who had had his leg amputated the day before; during the examination I never looked at him, for I felt his eyes were fixed on my face. Suddenly he exclaimed: 'It's no use, doctor; you can keep your eyes down, but you can't hide your mouth,—that says death.' It was the truth; mortification had set in, and he died the next morning. After that I let my beard grow, and so long as I remain a surgeon, which I shall so long as my hand is steady enough to guide the knife, it will stay as it is."
"Well, I think you are right," said Mr. Berkley; "but by and by, when you get a wife, perhaps she will think differently, and the beard, and the profession too, may have to go. The last, I hear, pays you nothing."