Good advice, undoubtedly.  Only Hen didn’t happen to know the most peculiar circumstances....

The two girls sat side by side on a sofa that sorely needed the ministrations of an upholsterer.  Hen was sweet-faced, but habitually pale, usually a little worn.  Her eyes and expression saved her from total eclipse in whatever company; otherwise she would have been annihilated now by the juxtaposition of her cousin.  Cally’s face was framed in an engaging little turn-down hat of gold-brown and yellow, about which was carelessly festooned a long and fine brown veil.  Hen, gazing rather wistfully, thought that Cally grew lovelier every year.

“I’ll tell you, Cally!” she said, suddenly.  “Do you know what you ought to do?  Talk to V.V. about all this!”

Cally repressed a little start; though the thought, to speak truth, was far from being a new one.  But how could she possibly talk to V.V. without the ultimate disloyalty to papa?...

“No,” she said, quietly, after a brief pause.  “I could hardly do that.”

“Why not?  He’s thought out all these things further than anybody I know.  And he’ll—­”

“Hen, have you forgotten what he wrote in the paper about papa last year—­what he’s going to write next month.  Don’t you see my position?”

“I don’t care what he writes in the papers!...  When it comes to people, there’s nobody so kind—­and wise.  And—­”

“He’s the one person,” said Cally, resolutely, “I could not possibly talk to about it.”

Henrietta, falling back on the thought she had set out with, laughed good-naturedly.

“Then, I suppose, you’ll want to fly at once.  He’s due here at any minute, you know—­in fact, he’s half an hour late now—­”

“Here!...  Is he coming here this afternoon?”

This time her start was without concealment.  Hen looked genuinely surprised.

“He’s our doctor—­I told you the other day ...  But he doesn’t bite, my dear!  You look as if I’d said that a grizzly bear and three mad ogres were loping down the steps.”

“I never think of him as a doctor somehow,” said Cally, recovering, with a little laugh.  “So I couldn’t imagine—­”

“Second largest practice in town—­only I’ll admit that his not charging any fees has something to do with it.  In fact V.V.’s patients usually borrow anything that’s loose, including his hats, suits, and shoes ...  Cally, it’s like a play, for I believe there he is now ...”

True enough, a firm but unequal footstep just then sounded on the Cooneys’ wooden steps outside.  But Hen sat still, a far-away look in her eyes.

“Did you hear what Pond said, Cally, the first time he saw V.V.?—­’Who’s that man with the face like a bishop that never grew up?’...  Do you know, I never look at him without remembering mean things I’ve done and said, and wishing I hadn’t ...”

She rose as the bell rang, started toward the door, hesitated, turned in the middle of the floor.