w, and the family hate her for it. But Master
Robertson makes it all safe, Mrs. Shipman says."

"That's a queer thing," said she. "I took in a dear little picture of
the boy and girl this afternoon, to cheer her up a bit, and told her to
try to think they were the real ones, who'd soon be with her, for that
matter, and so happy to see their dear mamma, and she went white as a
sheet and fainted in my arms. Of course, I didn't refer to it again.
She's quiet now, holding the picture, but I feared they were dead and
you hadn't known."

"Oh, no," said I. "I'm sure not," and then I remembered that I'd been
told there was but one in family. However, that's often said when
there's a nurse to take care of small children (though it's not quite
fair, perhaps), and I was certain of the children, anyway, for there
were toys all about Mrs. Shipman's room and some seed-cookies and
"animal-crackers," as they call those odd little biscuits, in a tin on
her mantel.

However, we were soon to learn something that made me, at least, all
the more curious. The doctor came that morning and told Miss Jessop
that her services would be no longer required, after he had seen her
patient.

"Mrs. Childress is perfectly recovered," he said, "and she has
unfortunately conceived a grudge against you, my dear girl. I need
you, anyway, in town. Poor old Shipman can't last the night now, and I
want all that business disposed of very quietly. I have decided not to
tell Mrs. Childress until it is all over and the funeral done with.
She is in a very morbid state, and as I knew her husband well I have
taken this step on my own responsibility. Hodges seems perfectly able
to run things, and to tell the truth, it would do your mistress far
more good to attend to that herself," he said, turning to me.

"It would be a good thing for the poor woman to have some one about
her, Dr. Stanchon," the nurse put in quietly. "If there were children
in the house, now----"

"Children!" he cried, pulling himself up and staring at her. "Did you
speak to her about them? Then that accounts for it! I should have
warned you."

"Then they did die?" she asked him. "That's what I thought."

"I'm afraid not," he said, shaking his head with a queer sort of sad
little smile. "I forgot you were strange here. Why, Miss Jessop,
didn't you know that----"

"Excuse me, sir, but there's no sign of your mare about--did you tie
her?" says Hodges, coming in in a great h