broken!"

"The rabbit is packed," I said, "and I saw to the frocks myself."

There's but one way with the sick when they're like that, and that's to
humour them, you see. So she slept and I got a little nap for myself.
I was glad the children were away by next morning, for she was worse,
the cook lost her head, and managed to break the range so that the
water-back leaked and John and Hodges were mopping and mending all day.
The madam herself had a bad turn and the doctor (a New York doctor for
madam, you may be sure!) brought out a handsome, dark woman, the
trained hospital nurse, with him. Madam wasn't allowed to know how bad
her old nurse was.

So it turned out that I'd been a week in the house without ever seeing
my mistress. The nurse and I would meet on the stairs and chat a
little, evenings, and once I took a turn in the grounds with her. She
was a sensible sort of girl, not a bit above herself, as our English
nursing-sisters are, sometimes, but very businesslike, as they say, and
a good, brisk way with her. She saw a lot more than she spoke of, Miss
Jessop did, I'll warrant!

"It's a good thing the children are sent away," I said. "They always
add to the bother when there's sickness."

"Why, are there children?" says she. "Oh, yes, a boy and a girl," I
answered, "poor old Mrs. Shipman is forever talking about them. She
thinks she's their nurse, it seems, as she was their mother's."

"I wish they were here, then," says she, "for I don't like the looks of
my patient at all. She doesn't speak seven words a day, and there's
really little or nothing the matter with her, that I can see. She's
nervous and she's low and she wants cheering, that's all. I wonder the
doctor doesn't see it."

That night, after both patients were settled, she came up to my room
and took a glance at the old lady, who was going fast.

"Mrs. Childress will soon have to know about this," she said and then,
suddenly, "Are you sure about the children, Sarah?"

"Sure about them?" I repeated after her. "In what way, Miss Jessop?"

"That there are any," says she.

"Why, of course," I answered, "Mrs. Shipman talks of nothing else.
They're with their aunty, in New Jersey, somewhere. It's a good thing
there are some, for from what she says when she's rambling, the house
and all the property would go out of the family otherwise. It's been
five generations in the Childress family, but the nearest now is a
cousin who married a Je