“She is in the library, answering a letter for me; she will be through very shortly.  Do you want her particularly, dear?” innocently questioned the lady who was absorbed in filling a jardiniere with scarlet geraniums.

“N-o, not very; only I’ve been growing conscious during the last few minutes that there is a—­er—­something lacking in the atmosphere.  Dr. Stanley, do have this rocker,” she interposed, with a sly smile, and pushing one towards him, “it’s too warm this morning for such a waste of energy.”

Either by chance or intention, she had swung the chair directly opposite a low window that commanded a view of the library, where Katherine, in a familiar gown of pale yellow chambrey, was oblivious to all but the work in hand.  The young man shot a searching look at the mischievous elf; then, with a quiet “thank you,” deliberately took the proffered seat, but, ten minutes later, he also was missing from the company.

He found Katherine seated before her own private desk, and in the act of stamping the letter which he had just seen her addressing.

“I hope I do not intrude?” he observed, in a tone of polite inquiry.

“No, I am just through,” she replied, as she carefully pressed the still moist stamp in place with a small blotter.

“I have come to ask if you have a copy of that flashlight picture of the ‘Flower Carnival’” he resumed.  “Dorrie’s is at home, but she wishes to have some more copies, and as I am going to town to-morrow I thought I would attend to it.”

“Yes, I have mine right here,” said Katherine, as she took a small key from a drawer and proceeded to unlock a compartment in her desk, smilingly explaining as she did so:  “This is where I keep my choicest treasures—­things that I do not let everyone see.”

“Must I look away?” demanded her companion, in a mock-injured tone.

“Oh! no”—­with a silvery ripple—­“I am not quite so secretive as that.”

Removing a box, she carefully placed it one side, then brought forth a package nicely wrapped in tissue paper.  Unfolding this, she disclosed several photographs, and among them was the one he had asked for.

“How fortunate you were to get so good a picture!” she observed, and studied it a moment before giving it to him.  “How happy Dorrie looks!  Although, to see her now, one would scarcely believe that this was ever taken for her.”

“No, indeed!  What a marvelous change a year has made in that child!” said Dr. Stanley, in an animated tone.

“‘A year!’ I am sure you do not quite mean that,” and she lifted a questioning look to him.

“No, I do not—­thank you for correcting me,” he gravely rejoined.  “I know time has had nothing to do with it—­that we owe it all to Christ—­Truth.  How watchful one needs to be of one’s words, in Science.”

“Yes, or one is liable to give wrong impressions without meaning to.  It is scientific to be exact, and”—­with a soft sigh—­“we all have to learn that by being continually on guard.”