The doctor laughed and looked up at Pearl. "No-body ever promised to be my girl, Libby," was his reply.
"I wish you had one, so you could tell me about it," she said, quite disappointed.
"I can tell you what it is like, all right—or at least, I can imagine what it would be like."
"Would you stay away from your girl and never come back, and forget all about her?" she asked wistfully.
Looking up, the doctor noticed that Pearl had picked up a newspaper and appeared to be not listening at all.
"If I had a girl, Libby Anne," he said, very slowly, "I might stay away a long time, but I'd come back sometime, oh, sure; and while I was away I'd want my girl to lie still, if she had a cold and was out in a tent trying to get better to go to her grandmother's, and I'd want my girl to be just as happy as she could be, and always be sure that I would come back."
"I like you, Doctor," she said, after a pause, "and if I wasn't Bud's girl I would like to be yours. Maybe Pearl Watson would be your girl, Doctor," she said quickly. "I'll ask her when she comes, if you like?"
"I wish you would, Libby Anne," he said gravely.
When he looked up Pearl had gone.
It was a week before the doctor saw Pearl. One night he met her coming home from school. It was the first day of March, and it seemed like the first day of spring as well. From a cloudless sky the afternoon sun poured down its warmth and heat.