Doctor Sandford bent a little over Daisy's couch, holding her hand still, and examining her.
"What is the matter, Daisy?" said he.
Daisy fidgeted. The doctor's fine blue eyes were too close to her and too steady to be escaped from. Daisy turned her own eyes uneasily away, then brought them back; she could not help it. He was waiting for her to speak.
"Dr. Sandford," she said, humbly, "won't you please excuse me?"
"Excuse you what, Daisy?"
"From telling you what you want to know."
"Pray, why should I?"
"It is something that is quite private to myself."
If the doctor's lips remained perfectly still for some moments, it was because they had a private inclination to smile, in which he would not indulge them. Daisy saw nothing but the most moveless gravity.
"Private from all but your physician, Daisy," he said at last.
"Do not you know he is an exception to general rules?"