This reminded the doctor of his perplexity, and also brought the
comforting thought that Guy, who had never failed him yet, could
surely offer some suggestions. But he would not speak of her just now;
he had other matters to talk about, and so, jamming his penknife into
a pine table covered with similar jams, he said: "Agnes, it seems, has
come to Aikenside, notwithstanding she declared she never would, when
she found that the whole of the Remington property belonged to your
mother, and not your father."

"Oh, yes. She got over her pique as soon as I settled a handsome
little income on Jessie, and, in fact, on her too, until she is
foolish enough to marry again, when it will cease, of course, as I do
not feel it my duty to support any man's wife, unless it be my own, or
my father's," was Guy Remington's reply; whereupon the penknife went
again into the table, and this time with so much force that the point
was broken off; but the doctor did not mind it, and with the jagged
end continued to make jagged marks, while he continued: "She'll hardly
marry again, though she may. She's young--not over twenty-six---

"Twenty-eight, if the family Bible does not lie; but she'd never
forgive me if she knew I told you that. So let it pass that she's
twenty-six. She certainly is not more than three years your senior, a
mere nothing, if you wish to make her Mrs. Holbrook;" and Guy's dark
eyes scanned curiously the doctor's face, as if seeking there for the
secret of his proud young stepmother's anxiety to visit plain Mrs.
Conner that afternoon. But the doctor only laughed merrily at the idea
of his being father to Guy, his college chum and long-tried friend.

Agnes Remington--reclining languidly in Mrs. Conner's easy-chair, and
overwhelming her former friend with descriptions of the gay parties