"What makes you saddle me with a wife, Miss Cosie?"
"There, there, you must not take it amiss of us," returned the little woman earnestly, laying her hand on his arm. "Of course we shall be glad to know her; and if there is anything that I can do to make her more comfortable when the poor thing comes amongst us a stranger, I will do it with all my heart."
"But, my dear Miss Cosie," with a smile, "I have no wife."
"No wife!" and Miss Cosie's eyes grew round, and she threw up her plump little hands in astonishment; "no wife! do you mean she is dead too, Dr. Stewart?"
"I mean that I never had one," laughing now outright. "Don't you know poor men have no right to such luxuries? When one has a mother and a sister to maintain, one must put away those sort of thoughts, however much one is tempted," and Dr. Stewart spoke now in a curiously constrained voice.
"Miss Cosie, I must go home now, Cara will be looking for me," exclaimed Faith, rising hurriedly. There was a misty look in the soft blue eyes, and the color had returned to her face.
"May I take the right of an old friend, and come and see you and your sisters to-morrow," asked Dr. Stewart, as he held her hand. "May I come and talk to this Cara, of whom I have heard so much?"
"Yes; we shall be very glad," she replied, almost inaudibly, and then he let her go.
He left Miss Cosie after that, and went back to the little group gathered round the window; but a change had come over them; they seemed talking seriously.
"Miss Catherine, are you in earnest?" Mr. Logan was saying, in an incredulous voice. He pushed his spectacles up to his forehead as he spoke, and the keen, near-sighted eyes seemed to probe the girl's soul as he spoke.