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“HOW are you to-day, Mrs. Carleton?” asked Dr. Farleigh, as he sat down by his patient, who reclined languidly in a large cushioned chair.

“Miserable,” was the faintly spoken reply. And the word was repeated,–“Miserable.”

The doctor took one of the lady’s small, white hands, on which the network of veins, most delicately traced, spread its blue lines everywhere beneath the transparent skin. It was a beautiful hand–a study for a painter or sculptor. It was a soft, flexible hand–soft, flexible, and velvety to the touch as the hand of a baby, for it was as much a stranger to useful work. The doctor laid his fingers on the wrist. Under the pressure he felt the pulse beat slowly and evenly. He took out his watch and counted the beats, seventy in a minute. There was a no fever, nor any unusual disturbance of the system. Calmly the heart was doing its appointed work.

“How is your head, Mrs. Carleton?”

The lady moved her head from side to side two or three times.

“Anything out of the way there?”

“My head is well enough, but I feel so miserable–so weak. I haven’t the strength of a child. The least exertion exhausts me.”

And the lady shut her eyes, looking the picture of feebleness.

“Have you taken the tonic, for which I left a prescription yesterday?”

“Yes; but I’m no stronger.”

“How is your appetite?”

“Bad.”

“Have you taken the morning walk in the garden that I suggested?”

“O, dear, no! Walk out in the garden? I’m faint by the time I get to the breakfast-room! I can’t live at this rate, doctor. What am I to do? Can’t you build me up in some way? I’m burden to myself and every one else.”

And Mrs. Carleton really looked distressed.

“You ride out every day?”

“I did until the carriage was broken, and that was nearly a week ago. It has been at the carriage-maker’s ever since.”

“You must have the fresh air, Mrs. Carleton,” said the doctor, emphatically. “Fresh air, change of scene, and exercise, are indispensable in your case. You will die if you remain shut up after this fashion. Come, take a ride with me.”

“Doctor! How absurd!” exclaimed Mrs. Carleton, almost shocked by the suggestion. “Ride with you! What would people think?”

“A fig for people’s thoughts! Get your shawl and bonnet, and take a drive with me. What do you care for meddlesome people’s thoughts? Come!”

The doctor knew his patient.

“But you’re not in earnest, surely?” There was a half-amused twinkle in the lady’s eyes.

“Never more in earnest. I’m going to see a patient just out of the city, and the drive will be a charming one. Nothing would please me better than to have your company.”

There was a vein of humor, and a spirit of “don’t care” in Mrs. Carleton, which had once made her independent, and almost hoydenish. But fashionable associations, since her woman-life began, had toned her down into exceeding propriety. Fashion and conventionality, however, were losing their influence, since enfeebled health kept her feet back from the world’s gay places; and the doctor’s invitation to a ride found her sufficiently disenthralled to see in it a pleasing novelty.

“I’ve half a mind to go,” she said, smiling. She had not smiled before since the doctor came in.

“I’ll ring for your maid,” and Dr. Farleigh’s hand was on the bell-rope before Mrs. Carleton had space to think twice, and endanger a change of thought.

“I’m not sure that I am strong enough for the effort,” said Mrs. Carleton, and she laid her head back upon the cushions in a feeble way.

“Trust me for that,” replied the doctor.

The maid came in.

“Bring me a shawl and my bonnet, Alice; I am going to ride out with the doctor.” Very languidly was the sentence spoken.

“I’m afraid, doctor, it will be too much for me. You don’t know how weak I am. The very thought of such an effort exhausts me.”