Doctor Smith and Mrs. Smith, of Timbertown, lunched that day with one of the windows of the dining-room wide open, so bland and bright was the air. They had trout from the mill-pond—the first of the season—and steamed apple-pudding. Their trusty cook, who also waited on table, had the platter of trout bones in one hand and the pudding in the other, and was on the point of removing the first from before the doctor and replacing it with the second, when a shadow fell across a corner of the table. All three looked up and beheld a bare-headed young man in a leather coat at the window.
The cook set the pudding down with a thump that split it from top to bottom; but as the doctor and his wife jumped to their feet without so much as a glance at the wrecked pastry, the cook also ignored it and retired hastily with the platter of bones.
“Hello!” exclaimed the doctor. “Speak of the—we were just talking about you, major. Come in. Glad to see you.”
“I’d better not,” replied Tom. “I’ve come to take you to Gaspard Javet’s clearings. His grand-daughter is ill, and Mick Otter thinks it is diphtheria,—thinks it came with some Indians from Tinder Brook. The bus is about two miles away,—so if you’ll give me a tin of gas and come along, I’ll be greatly obliged.”
The Smiths looked greatly concerned.
“I’m with you,” said the doctor. “A tin of gas? Right-o. Better put on furs, hadn’t I? Eat something while I hustle. Feed the major, Dickon.”
As Tom persisted in his refusal to enter, from fear that he might have the germs of diphtheria on his person, Mrs. Smith fed him on the window-sill with cold ham and pudding and coffee.
“We were speaking of you just a little while before you appeared,” she said. “Last week’s Herald arrived this morning, with good news; and we were just wondering how we could get word to you; and here you are—with bad news. But you mustn’t worry, major. Jim is a great doctor.”
“I know he is,” replied Tom. “I’ve seen him at work. He is a two-handed man. And I haven’t wasted any time. Mick Otter threw the scare into me last night and I nailed the old bus together and started this morning.”
“I am glad you hurried—but you’ll be careful, won’t you? Try not to crash with Jim, please.”