r sleep."

"I am very strong, sir. I do all the work in the house myself. I know
how to make gruel, and porridge, and beef tea, and soup; and _mon pere_
shall have everything nice."

The doctor smiled, and felt sure that no better nurse could be provided
for the sick man.

"Where is your mother?" he asked. "Is she living?"

"I have no mother. Leo has no mother. We are not Andre's own children;
but we love him just the same, and he loves us just the same."

"But who was your mother?"

"I don't know."

"Doesn't Andre know?"

"He does not."

"You have some kind of a history, I suppose," added the doctor, greatly
interested in the girl.

"_Mon pere_ don't like to talk about it. He seems to be afraid that
some one will get me away from him; but I'm sure I don't want to go
away from him; I wouldn't leave him for a king's palace."

"Why do you call him '_mon pere_'?"

"He taught me to call him so when I was little. Andre's father was an
Italian, and his mother a French woman; but he was born in London."

"Where did he find you?"

"At the cholera hospital."

"Where?"

"I don't know. He always looked so sad, and his heart seemed to be so
pained when I asked him any questions about myself, that I stopped
doing so long ago. When I was five years old, he found me playing about
the hospital, where hundreds and hundreds of people had died with
cholera. I had the cholera myself; and he came to play with me every
day; and when they were going to send me to an orphan asylum, or some
such place, he took me away, and promised to take care of me. Ah, _mon
pere_" said she, glancing tenderly at the sick man, and wiping a tear
from her eyes, "how well he has kept his promise! I can't help thinking
he loved me more than any real father could. I never saw any father who
was so kind, and tender, and loving to his child as Andre is to me."

"And you don't know where this hospital was?"

"No, sir; and I don't want to know. _Mon pere_ thinks my parents died
of the cholera; but Andre has been father and mother to me. He would
die if he lost me."

"And your brother--was he taken from the cholera hospital?" asked the
doctor.

"No, sir," replied Maggie, rising and speaking in a whisper to the
physician, so that Leo should not hear what she said. "Andre had to
leave me all alone when he went to the shop, and he went to the
almshouse to find a poor orphan to keep me company. He found Leo, whose
father and mother had both died