“French blood?” insinuated the doctor.

“French?—­as if wickedness had a country and was too patriotic to travel!  You are an olive-gray, Maurice.  Besides, you could as truthfully accuse an oyster of light behavior.”

On making further inquiries one lady told him that she understood the beauty was a bluestocking, and when he asked another why Fay appeared to shun gentlemen’s society, “To make them more eager to seek her,” was the reply.

“What an amount of trash one can hear at these places in a single hour!” muttered Dr. Grey as he retired that night:  then he added, thoughtfully, “I shall certainly make her acquaintance.”

The night brings counsel.  Maurice decided, on awaking, that he must depend on himself if he would succeed in overcoming Miss Lafitte’s prejudice.  What if he should make an excuse and speak to her without an introduction?  Chance must determine.  About the same hour that he had met her the day before the young man directed his steps to the alley where she had been walking.  There she was, pacing to and fro meditatively, enjoying the morning air.

“She looks the sanest of sane people,” thought the doctor as he noted her calm expression, but the next moment he had occasion to retract his opinion.  The girl caught the sound of his footstep, looked up, recognized him, and, turning, ran like a frightened roe in the opposite direction.

Dr. Grey, giving forth a prolonged low whistle, stood motionless with astonishment, but suddenly he too was running at full speed.  The Atalantis had stepped into a hole made by the washing of the rain, and falling forward with violence lay motionless.

The instincts of the physician replaced those of the man as he gently raised the insensible form and laid it on a grassy bank.  But her antipathy, whatever its cause, seemed more potent than the injury she had received, for as he touched her she moved uneasily, and opening her eyes said with difficulty, “Thanks.  I am not hurt:  I do not need your assistance.”

“I am a physician,” returned Maurice gravely.  “Your foot has had a terrible wrench:  permit me.”  He dropped on his knee before, her and proceeded to make an examination with so much quiet authority that she ceased to resist.  “There is nothing wrong here:  do you feel pain elsewhere?”

She was trembling, for the nervous reaction of the shock had taken place, but she endeavored to conceal it:  “I have an oppression on my chest, and this arm—­I cannot lift it.”

“Do not be alarmed:  lean against this tree.”

She reluctantly submitted as he carefully felt the arm—­nothing; the shoulder, across to the neck—­a cry of pain.

“The clavicle is fractured.”

“Is that very dreadful?” and now her eyes sought his for the first time.

“Oh no:  it happens every day.  It will be tedious perhaps, but can scarcely be called an accident at all—­only a mishap.  I think I will bring you a little brandy before you try to walk.”