Excuse me, Gibson, but we're talking like friends.Have you never thought of marrying again? It would not be like a first marriage, of course; but if you found a sensible agreeable woman of thirty or so, I really think you couldn't do better than take her to manage your home, and so save you either discomfort or worry; and, besides, she would be able to give your daughter that kind of tender supervision which, I fancy, all girls of that age require.It's a delicate subject, but you'll excuse my having spoken frankly.' Mr Gibson had thought of this advice several times since it was given;but it was a case of 'first catch your hare.' Where was the 'sensible and agreeable woman of thirty or so?' Not Miss Browning, nor Miss Phoebe, nor Miss Goodenough.Among his country patients there were two classes pretty distinctly marked: farmers, whose children were unrefined and uneducated;squires, whose daughters would, indeed think the world was coming to a pretty pass, if they were to marry a country surgeon.But the first day on which Mr Gibson paid his visit to Lady Cumnor, he began to think it possible that Mrs Kirkpatrick was his 'hare.' He rode away with slack rein, thinking over what he knew of her, more than about the prescriptions he should write, or the way he was going.He remembered her as a very pretty Miss Clare: the governess who had the scarlet fever;that was in his wife's days, a long time ago; he could hardly understand Mrs Kirkpatrick's youthfulness of appearance when he thought how long.
Then he heard of her marriage to a curate; and the next day (or so it seemed, he could not recollect the exact duration of the interval), of his death.