Dr. Morrell jumped up with an apparent desire to escape that wounded and
exasperated her. She put out her hand quite haughtily to him and asked,
"Oh, must you go?"
"Yes. How do you do, Mrs. Wilmington? You'd better get Miss Kilburn to give
you a cup of her coffee."
"Oh, I will," said Lyra. She forbore any reference, even by a look, to the
intimate little situation she had disturbed.
Morrell added to Annie: "I like your plan. It 'a the best thing you could
do."
She found she had been keeping his hand, and in the revulsion from wrath to
joy she violently wrung it.
"I'm _so_ glad!" She could not help following him to the door, in the
hope that he would say something more, but he did not, and she could only
repeat her rapturous gratitude in several forms of incoherency.
She ran back to Mrs. Wilmington. "Lyra, what do you think of my taking Mr.
Peck's little girl?"
Mrs. Wilmington never allowed herself to seem surprised at anything; she
was, in fact, surprised at very few things. She had got into the easiest
chair in the room, and she answered from it, with a luxurious interest in
the affair, "Well, you know what people will say, Annie."
"No, I don't. _What_ will they say?"
"That you're after Mr. Peck pretty openly."
Annie turned scarlet. "And when they find I'm _not_?" she demanded
with severity, that had no effect upon Lyra.
"Then they'll say you couldn't get him."
"They may say what they please. What do you think of the plan?"
"I think it would be the greatest blessing for the poor little thing," said
Lyra, with a nearer approach to seriousness than she usually made. "And the
greatest care for you," she added, after a moment.
"I shall not care for the care. I shall be glad of it--thankful for it,"
cried Annie fervidly.
"If you can get it," Lyra suggested.
"I believe I can get it. I believe I can make Mr. Peck see that it's a
duty. I shall ask him to regard it as a charity to me--as a mercy."
"Well, that's a good way to work upon Mr. Peck's feelings," said Lyra
demurely. "Was that the plan that Dr. Morrell approved of so highly?"
"Yes."
"I didn't know but it was some course of treatment. You pressed his hand
so affectionately. I said to myself, Well, Annie's either an enthusiastic
patient, or else--"