When the mail-boat was near due, my sister said that I must have the doctor to tea; for it would never do, said she, to accept his kindnesses and show no hospitality in return. In reply to this Doctor Luke said that I must present his compliments to my sister (which I thought a curious way of putting it), and say that he accepted the invitation with great pleasure; and, as though it were a matter of grave moment, he had me repeat the form until I knew it perfectly. That evening my sister wore a long skirt, fashioned in haste from one of my mother’s gowns, and this, with my mother’s keys, which she kept hanging from her girdle, as my mother used to do, made her very sweetly staid. The doctor came speckless, wearing his only shirt, which (as Tom Tot’s wife made known to all the harbour) he had paid one dollar to have washed and ironed in three hours for the occasion, spending the interval (it was averred) in his room. While we waited for the maids to lay the table, my sister moved in and out, directing them; and the doctor gazed at her in a way so marked that I made sure she had forgotten a hook or a button, and followed her to the kitchen to discover the omission.
“Sure, Bessie, dear,” I began, very gingerly, “I’m fair dreadin’ that you’re—you’re——”
She was humming, in happy unconsciousness of her state; and I was chagrined by the necessity of disclosing it: but resolutely continued, for it must be done.
“Loose,” I concluded.
She gave a little jump—a full inch, it may be—from the floor.
“Davy!” she cried, in mixed horror and distress. “Oh, dear! Whereabouts?”
“Do you turn around,” said I, “an’ I’ll soon find out.”
She whirled like a top. But I could find nothing awry. She was shipshape from head to toe.
“’Tis very queer,” said I. “Sure, I thought you’d missed a button, for the doctor is lookin’ at you all the time.”