Page:West of Dodge (1926).pdf/133

 "What are this particular doctor's aspirations, then?"

"Well, service, in the first place; service to the greatest number of people possible in the life of one man. I think that's every earnest physician's aim."

"Where you have to divide service to humanity among a lot of physicians, there isn't humanity enough to go around sometimes," she said.

Dr. Hall glanced at her with a smile.

"If that's true in the big places, can't it be doubly true in the little ones?" he asked. "Ross has kept competition down with his gun, they say. I couldn't do that, you know."

"You could make yourself so indispensable nobody could compete with you," she declared. "We're just an example of it; we feel we couldn't do without you now."

"Do you feel that way?" he asked, his voice eager, bending toward her slightly, as if he feared his words might blow away.

"It's a family feeling," she said hastily, almost frightened, it appeared, by his gravely eager inquiry. "Aren't the railroaders going to have a dance to-night?"

Her interest in his career was gone, dispersed, he knew, by his blundering inquiry; his rude, thoughtless, unpardonable inquiry. She was too considerate to put him in his place with equal rudeness, as Annie or Mary Charles would have done. It was bad enough to apologize for, yet too crude to attempt to explain, when the intent was so obvious, the meaning so unequivocal.

"I'm happy in your family's confidence, Miss Cottrell," he said, feeling that he must venture something to make it appear less personal. "Yes, there's going to be a dance