The Doctor's cold little face lighted up. She smiled the most radiant smile, and it made her look all at once like a girl.
"My dear—I am crushed. I am an ant at your feet. Come here now, you great splendid creature, and let me hug you this minute."
Rose kept on to the door, where she turned:
"I don't think I ought to trouble you further," she said coldly.
The Doctor advanced. "Come now, I beg your pardon. I'm knocked out. I took you for one of those romantic country girls, who come to the city—helpless as babes. Come back."
Rose came near going on. If she had, it would have lost her a good friend. She felt that and so, when the Doctor put an arm around her to lead her back to the desk, she yielded, but she was still palpitating with the heat of her wrath.
"My dear, you fairly scared me. I never was so taken by surprise in my life; tell me all about yourself; tell me how you came to come, where you are—and all about it."
Rose told her—not all, of course—she told her of her college work, of her father, of the coulé, of her parting from her father.
"O yes," the Doctor interrupted, "that's the way we go on—we new men and women. The ways of our fathers are not ours; it's tragedy either way you put it. Go on!"
At last she had the story, told with marvelous unconscious power, direct, personal, full of appeal. She looked at Rose with reflective eyes for a little space.