“Red,” observed James Macauley, junior, “this place of yours looks like a drunkard's home.”

He glanced around him as he spoke. The criticism certainly found justification in every corner. No more neglected office could have been discovered belonging to any practitioner within an area of many miles.

“I suppose it does,” rejoined Burns from the depths of a big, dusty leather chair where he sat stretched in an attitude expressing extreme fatigue. “But I don't care a hang.”

Macauley looked at him. His eyes were closed. His arms lay upon the chair arms, relaxed and limp. For the first time his friend observed what might have been noted by a critical eye on any day during the last fortnight. The lines on the ordinarily strong, health-tinted face were deeper than he had ever seen them; the cheeks were thinner; there were even shadows under the thick eyelashes which outlined the lids of the closed eyes.

“Look here, old man,” Macauley cried, sudden conviction seizing him, “you're working altogether too hard. This miserable city epidemic has done you out. I've thought all the time you were trying to cover too much ground.”

“Ground's had to be covered,” replied the other briefly, without opening his eyes.

“Have the other fellows worked as hard as you?”

“Harder.”

“I don't believe it. They're all city men. You've done all this city work and looked after your own patients here, too, to say nothing of living in both places at once. With your housekeeper gone home to her sick folks, and Miss Mathewson off on one of your cases—no wonder this place looks the way it does.”

“It doesn't matter. Cut it out about the place. I'm going back in ten minutes.”

“You are! Not going to get to bed?”

“Don't know. I might snatch a nap now if you'd quit talking.”

Macauley closed his mouth. Presently he got up and stole out of the room. He was back again in a trice, a flask in one hand, a soda siphon in the other, and a small glass balanced on his thumb. When Burns, at the sound of a clock ticking somewhere, rubbed his eyes with his fists striking in and reluctantly opened them, Macauley spoke briskly:

“See here—I'm going to give you a bracer. I know your confounded notions, but they don't cut any figure when you need something to pull you together the way you do to-night.”

He started to measure out the amber liquid into the glass, but Burns put up a hand.

“Much obliged, but I don't want any.”

“You idiot—don't you know when to make an exception to your rule? I admit you've won out over the other fellows just by keeping a steady hand, but you're dead as a dog for rest to-night and you need a stiff one, if I'm any judge.”

“You're not—for me.” Burns sat up. “O Heavens, man, if I were going to break my rule at all it wouldn't be for a drink of anything. It would be for a stab in the arm with something that beats your stuff all out for stimulating the fatigue out of a fellow and making him feel like working till he drops.”

“Why don't you have it then?” asked Macauley curiously. “I should think if ever a used-up chap were justified in—”

“Don't give me that talk if you're my friend. It's hard enough to hold out without resorting to that game. I don't need you to advise it. I've seen enough of that sort of suicide. Buller and Fields are both down and out, and they began to brace early in the epidemic. Van Horn's a wreck, though he keeps going; and I tell you, I've more respect for that man than I ever had before. He's a poseur and a toadier, no doubt of that, and I've always despised him for it, but he has real ability and he's worked like a fiend through this muss, and not all for his rich patients, either. But he's weakening fast, and it's drug stimulation that's done it. No, sir: not for mine. But I'll make myself a cup of coffee, for I've got to keep awake, and I shall sleep in my tracks if I don't.”

He got up and stumbled out into his deserted kitchen. Macauley followed, helping as best he knew how, and watched his friend gulp down two cupfulls of a muddy liquid with feeling of admiration such as a small act of large significance may sometimes stir in one who apprehends.

Two days later Burns, starting toward home in the Imp at a late hour in the morning, passed a figure on a corner of a city street waiting for the outward-bound trolley. He slowed down beside it.

“May I take you home?” he asked, cap in hand, and interest showing in eyes which a moment before had been heavy with fatigue.

Ellen Lessing looked up. “I shall be very glad,” she answered, as she met his outstretched hand and let it draw her upward to the vacant seat. “The car is always so full at this hour, and I was longing for the feeling of the wind against my face.”

“It's cool for late August, and you'll get a breeze on the road home that will refresh you. You haven't touched water or milk in this plague-stricken district, I hope?”

“No, indeed. Martha warned me a dozen times before I left. How are things? Any better?”

“No new cases in twenty-four hours, and the old ones well in hand. I'm getting home earlier to-day than I've done for a month, and hope to have a few hours off duty. I was planning what to do with them as I came upon you.”

“I should think you could do nothing better with them than to go home and sleep,” she advised, looking up at his face with a critical, friendly survey of the signs of weariness written plainly there. “You are worn out, and that means something when one says it of so strong a man as you.”

“I could sleep a week, but I'm not sure that a few hours would more than aggravate my need. Besides, I shouldn't be at home an hour before I should be called out again. No, my plans were forming themselves differently, and now that I've met you they're taking definite shape. I want—well—suppose I don't tell you! Would you trust me to take you off on a rest-seeking expedition without explaining what I mean to do?”

“On a 'rest-seeking expedition'?” she repeated. “Doctor Burns, are you sure you hadn't better go on that alone? Suppose I chatter all the way?”

He smiled. “You're not a chatterer. And I don't want to go alone. I haven't had a chance for an hour with you for a month, I think. This is the only way I can get it. Will you go?”

“You provoke my curiosity. Yes, I think I'll go. I've been shopping all the morning and I deserve a reward of rest, if you're sure you know where to find it.”

He turned the Imp abruptly aside from the boulevard leading out of town down which they had been speeding. He made a detour of certain side streets which brought him up before a small side establishment bearing a sign which set forth an alluring invitation to motoring parties in need of food. He disappeared therein, and was absent for the space of a full twenty minutes. When he returned he was followed by a waiter with a hamper to whose bestowal in the back of the car he looked carefully.

As they sped away again, Burns turned to his companion, a smile of anticipation on his face, to meet a glance of some apprehension.

“You're not repenting your rash trust of me already, are you?” he demanded.

“I'm remembering that Martha has four guests at luncheon to-day, and expects me to be there!”

“Is that all? Don't let that worry you. We'll simply have a breakdown somewhere on the road conveniently near to a spot I know, where I can broil the beefsteak I have in that hamper, and make the coffee. 'Unavoidable detention' will be your apology.”

“'Irresistible temptation' will be my confession,” she admitted. “I'm not good at subterfuge and I'm so hungry that the mere mention of beefsteak out-of-doors—”

“If it weighs against the plates and salads of a woman's luncheon I shall have a great respect for you. Come on, let's run away! You from social duties, I from professional ones. I'll agree to stand out Martha in your defense. Unless, of course, the opportunity to wear a pretty frock and throw all the other women in the shade—”

She laughed. “That's precisely what Martha wants me to do!”

“Then fail her and let the other women win. It's too late to repent, anyhow, for here's where we turn off.”

The Imp itself seemed to be running away, so swiftly and silently it covered the new road leading off into the hills. Presently it was climbing them.

“I want to get where no call-boy monotonously repeating 'Doc-tor Bur-rns, Doc-tor Bur-rns', can get hold of me,” the Imp's driver explained. “I suppose you're not dressed—nor shod—for a rough walk of a quarter of a mile where the car can't go?”

“I'll sacrifice skirts and soles,” she promised. “Isn't the air out here glorious? I thought I was tired when I left the city: now I could climb that hill and enjoy it.”

“That's precisely what we'll do, then. There's a view from the top worth the scramble, but I wasn't sure you'd be game for it. Perhaps I'll know you better at the end of this afternoon than I do now. Is there a jolly, athletic girl hidden away under that demure manner of yours I've seen so far, I wonder?”

“Lead the way up that hill and you'll find out,” she answered with a challenging flash of her dark eyes.

He lodged the Imp among a clump of pines, got out the hamper and turned to his companion. She had pulled off her gloves, removed hat and veil and folded her long, gray coat away in the car. This left her dressed in the trim gray skirt of walking length and the gray silk blouse she had worn for shopping. Burns looked at her with approval.

“Transformed by magic from a fashionable lady in street attire to a girl ready for the woods,” was his comment. “I'm glad you leave off the hat—I'll match you by doffing the cap. Now aren't we a pair? Are you in for a rush up that first slope? Jove, I'm not half so tired as I was an hour ago, already!”

He caught her hand in his, his other arm through the hamper handle, and ran with her up the slope. At the edge of the steeper climb to come they stopped, breathing fast. “This isn't the way to begin, of course,” he admitted as they both regained their breath, laughing at their own enthusiasm, “but I couldn't resist that dash—a sort of dash for freedom. Now we'll take it more easily.”

They worked their way up and up among the rocks, he always in advance, reaching down a muscular right arm to help her at the steeper places, and once giving her a knee to step on when progress could be made only up the straight face of a big boulder. It was undoubtedly a stiff climb for a woman, but she showed no signs of flinching, and though her cheeks glowed richly and her wavy black locks were a trifle loosened from their usual order when at last she set foot upon the plateau at the top, she showed only the temporary fatigue to be expected after such unusual exertion.

“That makes the blood course through one's arteries in a way worth while,” was his comment as he regarded with satisfaction the splendid colour in her checks and the sparkle in her eyes. “Talk about rest! That's the way to get it! Burn up the products of fatigue, replace them with fresh cells full of oxygen, and you get rejuvenation. Look at that stretch of country before us! Isn't that worth the climb?”

“It's glorious! I've often looked at this height as our car drove by on the road over there, and wanted to climb it. But Martha and Jim are always for reeling off miles, and so, I thought, were you. I imagined there was nobody but myself to care for this.”

“And I thought you liked the porch and the pretty clothes you wear there better than anything I could show you in the open,” he owned with a laugh. “Not that I haven't enjoyed that porch and the sight of the clothes—they don't seem to be just like Martha's and Winifred's somehow, though I can't tell why! I've wanted to ask you off for a trip like this, but never was sure you'd enjoy it. I'm glad I've found out. I feel as if I'd wasted the summer.”

He fell to gathering wood for his fire, and when she had regained her breath she helped him in spite of his remonstrance. “Let me have all the fun, too,” she begged. “I haven't had a chance like this for four years. I used to camp in flannels all summer long, in the roughest sort of style, and loved it dearly. I could stand the tension of a long social winter twice as well as the other women on account of it.”

He understood, knowing that her husband had occupied a prominent official position which called upon him to maintain a corresponding place in the society of the city in which they had lived. Although he knew her to be still under thirty, he realized that on account of her early marriage she had had much experience in the world of affairs. It was this aspect of her he had always borne in mind as he had seen her before. Now he was beginning to recognize another side of her character and tastes, a side which interested him even more than the other had done.

Like a pair of children they collected their firewood, racing together to the base of operations with armfuls of dry sticks. When there was a big pile she surprised him by asking to be allowed to make the fire herself.

“I'll prove to you I'm a woodsman,” she asserted, and when she had performed her task after the most approved fashion of the skilled camper, he acknowledged that she had made good her boast. As the smoke cleared away in the direction which left the view unobscured and the spot he had selected for the lunching-place free from smoke, he grinned approvingly.

“I've no doubt you could grill the steak and brew the coffee with equal skill,” he admitted, “but I'm not going to let you. That's my job. I want to prove my prowess. Sit down on that log, please, and oversee me.”

She watched with hungry interest while he also gave evidence of his craft. It could hardly be the first time that a hamper had been packed for him at the place in the city, for nothing he needed had been left out, even to a big bottle of spring water with which to make the coffee. When his work was nearly complete she spread a square of white linen upon a flat rock and set forth the other contents of the hamper—olives and bread and butter, crisp celery-hearts, and cream cheese and a tin of biscuits. She heated the plates and cups before the fire, and as he withdrew his steak from the coals she set a smoking hot platter before him and offered him the materials for seasoning.

“You're a crack camper for sure,” he declared. “Ah-h—does that steak look fit for the gods, or not? How's the coffee? Clear?”

“Perfect. And the steak looks as if it would melt in one's mouth. Oh, isn't this fun? How glad I am I'm here and not at that luncheon!” She consulted a tiny watch. “It's two o'clock—they're sitting down,” she exulted. “Martha has waited half an hour for me and given me up, and she's perfectly furious. I'm wicked enough to feel that that fact is going to make this meal taste all the better!”

“Stolen steak and bread and butter eaten in secret have an extra relish—no doubt of that. Here—this juicy bit is for you to begin on. Set your teeth into it, partner! How's that for food, I ask of you?”

Sitting on the ground opposite each other with the flat rock between, they consumed this Arcadian banquet, eating with the zest born of exertion and the open air, the sunshine and the comradeship.

“Nothing has tasted quite so good to me in a year,” said she when the steak had vanished, dipping a white celery-heart in salt and biting the end off with teeth still whiter.

“Nothing ever tasted so good to me,” said he, leaning on his elbow and spreading a crisp biscuit with a layer of cheese. “I always think that of each meal I eat in a place like this, but this one seems to have a special flavour. I wonder if it can be the company?”

He smiled across at her, the sunshine among the pine needles of the tree above him throwing flecks of bright copper among the thick locks of his hair.

“I think the company is usually an important part of all such outings,” she admitted frankly. “I never took one before in the society of a wornout doctor who began to look like a boy again before he had finished his coffee. I really shouldn't know you were the same person who invited me to go on this expedition.”

“There's nothing like it for renewing one, body and mind. Actual physical repose isn't often the best cure for weariness: it's change of thought and occupation, particularly if the open air is a part of the cure. I've forgotten I have a care in the world: all I can think of is—may I say it?—yourself! I can't get over the wonder of seeing you turn from what Bob calls his 'pretty lady' into the girl I see before me—a girl who looks about nineteen, with a capacity for good sport in the open air I never dreamed of.”

“The open air would renew everybody's youth, I think, if everybody would go to living out-of-doors. We're through, aren't we? There isn't a crumb left! Now please go off and let me clear up and pack away. That's always the woman's part. Couldn't you lie down on that inviting carpet of needles over there under the big pine and get a bit of sleep?”

“Sleep—when I can talk to you?”

She nodded. “Yes, indeed. I'm not going to talk just now, anyhow, so you might as well make the best of it. Throw yourself down with your hands under your head, and look up at those beautiful boughs. Please!”

Rather reluctantly he obeyed, and she could see that, weary as he undoubtedly still was in spite of the refreshing meal, he really did not want to lose any of her society. Lying at full length on his side, his head propped on his hand, talking in the lazy tone of after-dinner content which had descended upon him, he continued to watch her as she repacked the hamper. It was not until she deliberately forsook him that he gave up to her wishes. But when, having been out of his sight for ten minutes, she peered cautiously through the bushes behind which she had screened herself, she saw what she had hoped for. His whole weary frame was stretched upon the pine-needle carpet, the lines of his face were relaxed, and his eyes fast shut.

The sun was far down the hills when he awoke. He lay blinking at the low-sweeping boughs above him for a little without realizing where he was; then, as the midsummer stillness which surrounded him took hold of his senses, he turned his head to recall to himself the conditions under which he had been sleeping. Only the hamper under a tree close by gave evidence that he was here by his own volition. He stared about, remembering that he had had a companion. He got somewhat stiffly to his feet, discovering as he did so that he had lain for a long time without stirring from the position in which slumber had overtaken him.

“Mrs. Lessing!” he called.

From some distance away came back a blithe answer: “Here, Doctor Burns!”

He started in the direction of the voice and presently came upon her sitting on a big granite boulder, busy with a lapful of pine cones out of which she seemed to be constructing something. She looked up, smiling.

“Why in the world did you let me sleep all the afternoon?” he reproached her.

“I should have wakened you in ten minutes more. Have I made you late for your work? I understood that you could afford a few hours for rest. You've only slept three.”

“Three! Good heavens! When I might have been spending them with you!”

He looked so chagrined that her smile changed into outright laughter. “You are very flattering. But I've been taking much more satisfaction in your repose than I could possibly have done in your society, no matter how brilliant you might have been.”

“That's not flattering, but I admit it has its practical side. Those three hours' sleep in the open air have put me on my feet again. Just the same, I want to eat my cake and have it, too! Promise me three consecutive hours of your company when I'm awake, or I shan't get over regretting what I've missed. Will you do this again with me some September day when I can make the time?”

“I promise with pleasure. I've had a charming afternoon all by myself and wandered all over the hillside, dreaming midsummer day-dreams. We must go, mustn't we?” She stood up, her hands full of her work.

“Tell me some of them, won't you, while we climb down to the car?” he begged.

“My happiest one,” she said as they descended, “is the making of a country home for little crippled children. I think I've found the spot—the old Fairmount place—it's not more than five miles from here. If I can only buy it at a reasonable figure—”

“Mrs. Lessing!” he broke in. “So that's the sort of thing that makes your day-dreams! No wonder—well!—”

“Why should you be surprised? Isn't that a delightful dream? If I can only make it come true—”

“You can. Do you want a visiting surgeon?”

“Of course I do. Will you—”

“Why, Mrs. Lessing,” said he, stopping short just below her on the steep path and looking up into her face with eyes of eager pleasure, “that's been one of my dreams so long I can't remember when I began to think about it. But I haven't been able to finance it yet, nor to find time to get anybody else to do it. If you'll provide the place I'll do everything I can to make it a success. There are no less than four children this minute I'm longing to get into such a home. We'll go into partnership if you'll take me. I why—you see, I can't even talk straight about it! And you—I thought you were a society woman!”

“I am a society woman, I suppose,” she answered laughing, “though our ideas might differ as to what that term stands for. But why should that prevent my caring for this lovely plan?”

“Evidently it doesn't. How many sides have you anyhow? I've found out two new ones to-day. Girl—and patron saint—”

“Ah, don't make fun of me. I'm no girl and very far from any kind of saint. Please help me down this four-foot drop as if I were a very, very old lady, for my head is dizzy with joy that I've found somebody to care for my schemes.”

He leaped down and held up his arms. “Come, grandma!” he invited, his face full of mischief and enthusiasm and happiness.

“I think I'll play girl, after all,” she refused gaily and, accepting one hand only, swung herself lightly down to his side.

“And it's 'bracers' the fellows think they need to put the heart back into them!” jeered Red Pepper Burns to himself. “Let them try the open country and a comrade like this—if there is another anywhere on earth! But they can't have her!”