"I certainly do, but you forget Mr. Ames."
"I do, and I intend to forget him," she replied, "and so does Dora."
The doctor shook his head. "I do not like it," he said; "young Haverley may be all very well,—I have a high opinion of him, already, but he is not the man for Dora. If he had any money at all, it would be different, but he has not. Now she would not be content to live at Cobhurst as it is, and he ought not to be content to have her do everything to make it what she would have it."
"Doctor," said Miss Panney, "if there is anything about all this in your medicine books, perhaps you know more than I do, and you can go on and talk; but you know there is not, and you know, too, that I was a very sensible middle-aged woman when you were toddling around in frocks and running against people. I believe you are trying to run against somebody now. Who is it?"
"Well," said the doctor, "if it is anybody, it is young Haverley."
Miss Panney smiled. "You may think so," she said, "but I want you to know that you are also running against me, and I say to you, confidentially, and with as much trust in you as I used to have that you would not tell who it was who spread your bread with forbidden jam, that I have planned a match between these two; and if they marry, I intend to make pecuniary matters more nearly even between them, than they are now."
The doctor looked at her earnestly.
"Do you suppose," said he, "that he would take money from you?"
"What I should do for him," she answered, "could not be prevented by him or any one else."
"But there is no reason," urged the other.