Book One Chapter 4 A Second Meeting

Her reserve quite melted, the girl led the way to the door where her mother stood in artless wonder.

"Mother, this is Dr. Serviss, of Corlear College."

"I'm glad to know you, sir," said Mrs. Lambert, with old-fashioned formality. "Won't you come in?"

"Thank you. It will be a pleasure."

"Are you a physician?" she asked, as she took his hat and stick.

"Oh, dear, no! Nothing so useful as that. I'm a doctor by brevet, as they say in the army." Then, as though acknowledging that his hostess was entitled to know a little more about her intrusive guest, he added: "I am a student of biology, Mrs. Lambert, and assistant to Dr. Weissmann, the head of the bacteriological department of Corlear Medical College. We study germs--microscopic 'bugs,'" he ended, with humorous glance at Viola. "What a charming bungalow you have here! Did you gather those wild flowers?"

Viola answered in the tone of a pupil to her master, "Yes, sir."

"But some of them grow high. You must be a mountaineer. Pardon my curiosity--it is inexcusable--but how long have you lived here?"

The mother looked at her daughter for confirmation. "Eight years."

"Of course you are from the East?"

"Yes, from Wisconsin."

He laughed. "We call Wisconsin a Western State. Of course, it's the ignorant prejudice of the New-Yorker, but I find it hard to think of you as actual residents of this far-away little town. I thought only miners lived here?"