The doctor laughed in answer, dropped the lines over the dashboard and leaned forward in his seat, the sun lighting up his clean-cut face.  Busy as he was—­and there were few busier men in town, as every hitching-post along the main street of Warehold village from Billy Tatham’s, the driver of the country stage, to Captain Holt’s, could prove—­he always had time for a word with the old nurse.

“And where have you been, Mistress Martha?” he asked, with a smile, dropping his whip into the socket, a sure sign that he had a few more minutes to give her.

“Oh, down to the beach to git some o’ the dirt off Meg.  Look at him—­did ye ever see such a rapscallion!  Every time I throw him in he’s into the sand ag’in wallowin’ before I kin git to him.”

The doctor bent his head, and for an instant watched the two dogs:  Meg circling about Rex, all four legs taut, his head jerking from side to side in his eagerness to be agreeable to his roadside acquaintance; the agate-eyed setter returning Meg’s attentions with the stony gaze of a club swell ignoring a shabby relative.  The doctor smiled thoughtfully.  There was nothing he loved to study so much as dogs —­they had a peculiar humor of their own, he often said, more enjoyable sometimes than that of men—­ then he turned to Martha again.

“And why are you away from home this morning of all others?” he asked.  “I thought Miss Lucy was expected from school to-day?”

“And so she is, God bless her!  And that’s why I’m here.  I was that restless I couldn’t keep still, and so I says to Miss Jane, ‘I’m goin’ to the beach with Meg and watch the ships go by; that’s the only thing that’ll quiet my nerves.  They’re never in a hurry with everybody punchin’ and haulin’ them.’  Not that there’s anybody doin’ that to me, ’cept like it is to-day when I’m waitin’ for my blessed baby to come back to me.  Two years, doctor—­two whole years since I had my arms round her.  Wouldn’t ye think I’d be nigh crazy?”

“She’s too big for your arms now, Martha,” laughed the doctor, gathering up his reins.  “She’s a woman—­seventeen, isn’t she?”

“Seventeen and three months, come the fourteenth of next July.  But she’s not a woman to me, and she never will be.  She’s my wee bairn that I took from her mother’s dyin’ arms and nursed at my own breast, and she’ll be that wee bairn to me as long as I live.  Ye’ll be up to see her, won’t ye, doctor?”

“Yes, to-night.  How’s Miss Jane?” As he made the inquiry his eyes kindled and a slight color suffused his cheeks.

“She’ll be better for seein’ ye,” the nurse answered with a knowing look.  Then in a louder and more positive tone, “Oh, ye needn’t stare so with them big brown eyes o’ yourn.  Ye can’t fool old Martha, none o’ you young people kin.  Ye think I go round with my eyelids sewed up.  Miss Jane knows what she wants—­she’s proud, and so are you; I never knew a Cobden nor a Cavendish that warn’t.  I haven’t a word to say—­it’ll be a good match when it comes off.  Where’s that Meg?  Good-by, doctor.  I won’t keep ye a minute longer from miss Gossaway.  I’m sorry it ain’t her tongue, but if it’s only her throat she may get over it.  Go ’long, Meg!”