Other Things Being Equal

Chapter X

CHAPTER X HUMBLE BARD presents his respects to my Lady Marechal Niel, and begs her to step down to the gate for about two minutes." The penciled note was handed to Ruth early the next morning as she stood in the kitchen beating up eggs for an omelette for her mother's breakfast. A smile of mingled surprise and amusement overspread her face as she read, and, turning the card, she saw, "Herbert Kemp, M.D.," as she had surmised. "Do I look all right, Mary?" she asked, hurriedly placing the bowl on the table and half turning to the cook as she walked to the door. Mary deliberately placed both hands on her hips and eyed her sharply. "And striped flannel dresses and hairs in braids," she began, as she always did, as if continuing a thought, "being nice, pretty flannel and nice, pretty braids, Miss Ruth do look sweet-like, which is nothing out of the common, for she always do!" The last was almost shouted after Ruth, who had run from her prolixity. As she hurried down the walk, she recognized the doctor's carriage, with the doctor himself, and Bob in state beside him. Two hands went up to two respective hats as the gate swung behind her, and she came with hands extended to Bob. "You're looking so much better," she exclaimed heartily, holding the bashfully outstretched hand. "Isn't this your first outing?" "Yes, lady." It had been impossible for her to make him call her by name. "He elected to pay his first devoirs to the Queen of Roses, as he expressed it," spoke up Kemp, his disengaged hand on the boy's shoulder, and looking with a puzzled expression at Ruth. 124 OTHER THINQS BEINQ EQUAL 125 Last night she had been a young woman; this morning she was a young girl; it was only after he had driven off that he discovered the difference lay in the arrangement of her hair, "Thank you, Bob; presently I expect to have you paying me a visit on foot, when we can come to a clearer understanding about my flower-beds," "He says," returned the boy, turning a humbly devoted look upon Kemp, "that I mustn't think of gardening for some weeks. And so—and so—" "Yes," "And so," explained the doctor, briskly, "he's going to hold my reins on our rounds, and drink in an ocean of sunshine to expend on some flowers—yours or mine, perhaps—by and by," Bob's eyes were luminous as they rested on the bearded face of his benefactor, "Now say all you have to say, and well be off," said Kemp, tucking in the robe at Bob's side, "I didn't have anything to say, sir; I only came to let her know," "And I'm so glad, Bob," said Ruth, smiling up into the boy's shy, speaking eyes. And, as people always will try to add to the comfort of a convalescent, Ruth, in turn, drew the robe over the lad's hands. As she did so, her cousin, Jennie Lewis, passed hurriedly by. Her quick blue eyes took in, to a detail, the attitudes of the trio, "Good-morning, Jennie," called Ruth, turning, "Are you coming in?" "Not now," She bowed stiffly and hurried on, "Cabbage-rose," Bob delivered himself of his sentiment without the slightest change of expression. The doctor gave a quick look at Ruth, She met it lightly, "He can't help his inspirations," she remarked, and stepped back as the doctor pulled the reins, "Come again, Bob," she called and, with a smile to Kemp, she ran in, "And I was going to say," continued Mary, as she re-entered 126 OTHER THINQS BEINQ EQUAL the kitchen, "that a speck of aig splashed on your cheek, Miss Ruth, when you was making the omelette-" "Oh, Mary, where?" "But not knowin' as you would see anybody, I didn't think to run after you; so it's just this side your mouth, like if you hadn't wiped it good after breakfast/' Ruth rubbed it off, wondering with vexation if the doctor had noticed it. Truth to say, the doctor had noticed it, and placed the same passing construction on it that Mary had suggestedNot that the little yellow splash occupied much of his attention. When he drove off, all he thought of Ruth...