do if anything happens to Ned — he’s just bound up in the boy. You’ll have to come again, Miss Stirling. I hope it’s nothing serious.”

“Oh, no, nothing serious,” agreed Valancy. She felt a little less humiliated. It was no wonder poor Dr. Trent had forgotten her at such a moment. Nevertheless, she felt very flat and discouraged as she went down the street.

Valancy went home by the short-cut of Lover’s Lane. She did not often go through Lover’s Lane — but it was getting near supper-time and it would never do to be late. Lover’s Lane wound back of the village, under great elms and maples, and deserved its name. It was hard to go there at any time and not find some canoodling couple — or young girls in pairs, arms