ion in every
bark, which indicated that he had really found something at last that
was worth mentioning. There was a sudden jangle of sleighbells in the
yard, and Mary's father went hastily to the door and called to the dog
to be quiet. A woman walked into the square of light thrown on the
snow from the open door, and asked if this was the place where a nurse
was needed.

Mr. Wood reached out and took her big valise and brought her into the
house, too astonished to speak. He was afraid she might vanish.

She threw off her heavy coat before she spoke, and then, as she wiped
the frost from her eyebrows, she explained:--

"I am what is called a pioneer nurse, and I am sent to take care of
your wife, as long as she needs me. You see the women in Alberta have
the vote now, and they have a little more to say about things than
they used to have, and one of the things they are keen on is to help
pioneer women over their rough places. Your neighbor, Mrs. Roberts, on
her way East, reported your wife's case, and so I am here. The
Mounted Police brought me out, and I have everything that is needed."

"But I don't understand!" Mr. Wood began.

"No!" said the nurse; "it is a little queer, isn't it? People have
spent money on pigs and cattle and horses, and have bonused railways
and elevator companies, or anything that seemed to help the country,
while the people who were doing the most for the country, the
settlers' wives, were left to live or die as seemed best to them.
Woman's most sacred function is to bring children into the world, and
if all goes well, why, God bless her!--but when things go wrong--God
help her! No one else was concerned at all. But, as I told you, women
vote now in Alberta, and what they say goes. Men are always ready to
help women in any good cause, but, naturally enough, they don't see
the tragedy of the lonely woman, as women see it. They are just as
sympathetic, but they do not know what to do. Some time ago, before
the war, there was an agitation to build a monument to the pioneer
women, a great affair of marble and stone. The women did not warm up
to it at all. They pointed out that it was poor policy to build
monuments to brave women who had died, while other equally brave women
in similar circumstances were being let die! So they sort of frowned
down the marble monument idea, and began to talk of nurses instead.

"So here I am," concluded Mrs. Sanderson, as she hung up her coat and
cap. "I am a m