Uncle John glanced at the card, and then, uttering an exclamation of surprise, passed it over to his wife, and, jumping up hastily, left the room.

“Is it the chief of the detectives?” asked Laura, animatedly.

“It isn’t a detective at all; it’s Dr. Phillips.”

“You don’t mean the Dr. Phillips,—­Bernard Phillips?”

“Yes.”

“How strange, and at this hour in the morning!  It must be something about Thanksgiving exercises,” interposed Maud.

“But we’re not his parishioners.  We don’t go to his church!”

“Oh, dear!” cried Mary; “I’m so disappointed.  I did hope it was the detective bringing Ally back.”

“Kate!” called Uncle John’s voice here, “will you come into the parlor?” and Mrs. Fleming, obeying this call, found herself a minute after exchanging greetings with the unexpected visitor.

“I want you to tell her, Doctor, just what you’ve told me exactly,” said Uncle John.  “It’s about Ally, my dear,” to his wife.  “She’s found, and—­and—­”

“She is at my house,” took up the Doctor; and then he told of the little girl who had come to his house the night before, of her grievous disappointment, and the accident that had befallen her,—­an accident that had robbed her of consciousness for a time, and from which she had only sufficiently recovered within the last few hours to answer the questions that were put to her in regard to her relations, that steps might be taken to restore her to them.

“And she is seriously hurt,—­she couldn’t come with you?” broke in Aunt Kate, breathlessly.

“No, she was not seriously hurt,” he assured her; and then came that most delicate and difficult part of the Doctor’s task,—­to tell, in what gentle phrase he could, that this wilful child refused to accompany him; that she had taken a foolish fancy into her head that her relations did not care for her,—­a fancy that had been strengthened into positive belief when she failed to find her uncle at the station, and had suggested to her a wild little plan of going away from them altogether, into some orphans’ home that she had heard of, where she was sure a place could be found for her.  Very gentle, indeed, was the phrasing of all this,—­so gentle and full of sweet human consideration for everybody’s shortcomings and mistakes that Aunt Kate forgot that the Doctor was a stranger; and with this forgetfulness the sharp pang of humiliation at a stranger’s knowledge of such a family difficulty, and the little sting of resentment at Ally’s attitude towards them all, was overborne to such an extent that she could frankly admit that her husband was right, and that none of them had had love and patience enough to help the child to fit into the new circumstances of her life.

It was an added pang, but there was no resentment in it, when she saw Ally’s sudden shrinking from her as she entered the Doctor’s parlor with him a little later.