“And isn’t this the very day of the year for forgetting?” answered Sue. “We always forget on this day even that we are paupers, for are not the soft breeze and the blue hills and the crystal air around us the good Lord’s, and has he not given all his creatures a share in them alike?”
“What a thing it must be,” Creepy sat thinking to himself, “to move so light and free as they do, and to go so far. It seems as though they were all melted into gold, passing under those trees, and that’s the last I see of them.”
The last he saw of Sue and the rest, but what came pushing out from under the gold, and nearing the almshouse so fast that Creepy saw it plainer and plainer every moment? A jet-black horse and a light chaise—Creepy knew them in an instant. It was the city physician’s chaise, Dr. Thorndyke’s, and had stood at the almshouse door a few moments every day while Ben was sick.
The matron saw him too.
“Now whom can he have been visiting on that road?” she said to herself. “Dear knows, there’s no house beyond us within the city limits but the Jellerbys’ and the Diffendorffers’. And now he’s hurrying back for dear life to folks of more importance.”
Very much mistaken was Mrs. Ganderby for once. So far from hurrying back “for dear life,” the horse’s pace was slackened as it drew near the almshouse, and just as it reached the gate, was drawn up with a short rein.
“Now may all that’s good deliver us!” exclaimed the matron, pulling her apron-strings into a hopeless knot, in her hurry to get it off. “Who does he think is dying or ready to die in the house to-day, that he must needs come unawares upon respectable housekeepers on the one morning in the year when there’s excuse if everything is not in its place as early as others. It’s none but a young doctor, surely, who has time to call when he is not sent for.”
It was of no use; the knot would not be untied, and the doctor could not be kept waiting, so Mrs. Ganderby proceeded to open the door, smoothing her apron and her temper as she went, until the doctor suspected nothing out of the way with either. And, indeed, it would have been hard to keep any vexation in one’s soul, when fairly face to face with Dr. Thorndyke, his own was so full of friendly greeting and good cheer; and, moreover, there was something in the hearty, vigorous way he was setting out in his own life that was positively refreshing, and made one feel he must certainly be the man to attack any of the numerous ills that might beset their own.
“Good-morning, Mrs. Ganderby,” said the doctor, “you wont take it amiss that I have come this time without being sent for, I hope.”
“O dear, no, sir; I’m sure it’s only too great a compliment that you should take a moment from all you have to think of. I’m only sorry our people have all gone off to-day for a tramp to the woods, that I dare say seems foolish enough to any one who has more range of pleasures; but however that may be, they’re all gone, and there’s no one at home but myself, nor no one could be more pleased to see you, sir; walk in, I beg.”