Edward Carleton looked up quickly, but without speaking, and when at last he did so, there was a new note of cordiality in his tone. “You knew Jack,” he repeated, “why, I’m glad to hear that, I’m sure. I’m very fond of my boy, Doctor. Boy? He’s a man now, though I can never seem to realize it. He’s only a little boy to me still, for all his six feet and his forty inches around the chest. Do you ever see him nowadays, Doctor?”
Helmar nodded. “Yes, indeed,” he answered readily, “not very often, of course. We’re in different lines of work, and both busy, I guess. But I run across him every once in a while. And this week we’re going to dine together. Jack and I and another fellow who was in our class—a sort of small reunion, to celebrate being five years out of college. He’ll be interested to know I’ve been out here.”
The old man nodded, gazing straight before him. “Doctor,” he asked suddenly, with apparent irrelevance, “you took my pulse to-day. What did you think of my heart?”
Helmar, surprised, parried with the clumsiness of a man not fond of deception. “Why,” he evaded, “I wouldn’t worry about that. All you have is a cold. You’ve got a pretty good heart, I think. We none of us grow any younger, though. That’s sure.”
Edward Carleton smiled a little grimly. “Thanks,” he said, “sometimes a patient knows more about himself than a doctor thinks he does. And I suppose I could guess pretty well what certain things mean. Never mind, though. As you say, we don’t grow any younger, more’s the pity.”
Both were silent, Helmar pausing a moment, uncertainly, with one hand on the knob of the door. Then the old man glanced up at him, with a smile genial and friendly, if a trifle wistful. “Good-by, Doctor,” he said courteously, “thank you for your interest. And tell Jack he’s always welcome, whenever he finds time to run out. The Birches is always his home, and his room stands ready for him—always.”
Five minutes later Helmar again passed down the broad steps of the piazza into the cheerful, dazzling sunlight. The little girl and her nurse were still seated under the shade of the big elm, and at once the spaniel, breaking away from his new friends, came tearing across the lawn to his master, ruthlessly scattering buttercups at every bound. With a laugh Helmar picked him up in his arms, and took him back to make his proper farewells. For the little girl the final moment of parting was a hard one, and she gazed longingly at her playmate, as though unwilling to have him go. Her nurse, observing her, shook her head in reproof. “Don’t be so foolish, Miss Rose,” she chided, “he’s only a little dog; you mustn’t be silly;” then, suddenly, she looked squarely at Helmar. “Will you excuse me, please,” she said softly, “but I know that you’re a friend of Mr. Jack’s. Would you tell me where a letter would reach him?”
Helmar eyed her keenly, and before his gaze the blue eyes dropped, and this time were not raised again. A faint flush stole into her cheeks. Helmar, in his turn, looked away. “Yes,” he answered shortly, “Mayflower Club, City, is his present address.”
He had his reward. At once the girl’s eyes were raised again, and her look sought his with the same smile that he had seen before. It was not a smile of the lips alone, but of the eyes as well, and a certain nameless something that flashed from still deeper within, a piquant frankness, a dangerous friendliness. Again he started to turn away, then stopped; his eyes, though half against his will, still seeking hers.
On the silence broke in the voice of the little girl. “Is it Cousin Jack?” she demanded, “do you know Cousin Jack?” And as Helmar nodded, she cried, “I wish you’d tell him to come out and see me. He hasn’t been here for an awfully long time. Will you tell him, please?”