“There she is now,” cried a voice in the distance behind her.
She turned to find Dr. Lake stopping his horse; he sprang out, not lightly, not like himself, and assisted his wife to the ground.
“She prefers your company, it seems,” he said, holding the reins with one hand and giving Tessa the other. “Talk fast now, for I shall not be gone long; I want to get home.”
“You can go home, I’ll come when I like,” replied Sue.
“We stopped at your house,” said Sue, as he drove on; “I asked him to leave me while he goes to Harrison’s; that Felix is always having a fit or something. Do you think Gerald looks so sick?” squeezing her hand under the folds of Tessa’s crimson and gray shawl that she might take her arm.
“He is much changed; I did not like to look at him; has he been ill?”
“Oh, you didn’t hear then! It was day before yesterday! He was thrown out; the horse ran away; he isn’t hurt much; he thinks he is, I do believe. I am not a nurse, I don’t know how to coddle people and fuss over them. The horse is a strange one that father had taken to try, and he threw Gerald out and ran away and smashed the buggy, and a farmer brought him home. He did look as white as a sheet and he hasn’t eaten any thing since; he went out yesterday and insisted upon coming out to-day. Father says that he’s foolhardy; but I guess he knows that he isn’t hurt; I sha’n’t borrow trouble anyway. He mopes and feels blue, but he says nothing ails him; he’s a doctor and he ought to know. Where are you going?”
“Not anywhere in particular; I came out for the air; we will walk on slowly.”
“We might go as far as your seat on the roots. Wasn’t that time an age ago? I didn’t feel married-y one bit. I want to go over to Sherwoods to-night to the Sociable, but Gerald says that I am heartless to want to go. I don’t think I am. I didn’t get married to shut myself up. Gerald never has any time to go anywhere with me, and it’s just as stupid and vexatious at home as it ever was. Don’t you ever get married.”
“Are you keeping your word?”