all she leaned over the
banister and said: "Dr. Kendricks will you come up here a minute or
two?"

"Yes, yes, what now? Did you feast too high yesterday?"

"I don't know. I feel sick all over. First I'm all of a shiver and then
so hot and my head aches."

"Well, we must inquire into it. Yes, you are flushed and getting
excited. I think it is a feverish cold and some indigestion. We'll soon
fix that all right. Luckily I brought my medicine chest along," and he
laughed.

"Doctor, you don't think--are there any more cases of scarlet fever?"
and her voice was tremulous.

"Scarlet fever! Don't get any such nonsense in your curly pate. No,
there's not another case and the little girl is recovering rapidly. Why
you've not been even exposed to it and yours is just a cold. Now,
alternate with these and I'll be in again this afternoon. But, I'd stay
in bed and rest."

She slipped into a soft white wrapper, and Katy came in to straighten up
her room.

"You were out late last night, Miss Zay and you've caught a cold."

"But, I so rarely have a cold."

"It sounds in your voice. Keep wrapped up good and warm. There's nothing
like heat to drive out those pernickety colds and I wish you'd drink
some hot water."

"I'll see by and by."

She turned her hot throbbing temple over on the pillow. If only she
could shut out the sight and the smell of the clairvoyant's room, and
that boy grasping for breath. It must have been something awful for them
both to die almost together and be shut up at once in their coffins; and
then a horror seized her. She had always been so well and joyous. Oh,
what if she should die? It would kill her mother. Girls were more to
their mothers; business called so many of the boys away.

She began to cry. The doctor and her father went down stairs. She
thought her mother would come in and tried to calm the sort of
hysterical mood. What _were_ they talking about so long? Was she worse
than the doctor had admitted? She heard her father's voice rise as if in
a passion which his visitor seemed trying to subdue. Oh, what _had_
happened?

Her mother entered the room very pale and with frightened eyes.

"Oh, Zay," she cried, dropping on the side of the bed, "have you any
idea what your father and Doctor Kendricks are quarreling about? Your
father is not easily excited--he used to be very quick in temper but he
has grown so gentle and considerate. But it is something that rouses him
to white heat. We have