d as for Miss
Merriman ... if I catch her so much as closing her eyes for one minute,
to-night, I'll wring her neck."

The nurse laughed; but Smiles' lips set, purposefully. "I forgot again.
Of course some one has got to sit up with little Lou, and I'll do it.
Why, Donald, poor Miss Merriman has been traveling and working all day
long, and she's just tired to death--she must be. Of course she has got
to get some rest. You go right up into the loft room, dear ..." and she
began to push the nurse gently toward the ladder.

"Rose," cut in the doctor, sternly, although his eyes held a pleased
twinkle, "you're apparently forgetting one thing--that I'm boss here for
the present, and that my nurses must learn to do as they are told,
without arguing. I'm sorry for Miss Merriman, too; but she knows just
what to do if anything happens, and you don't--yet. Besides, it won't be
the first time that she has stayed up twenty-four hours at a stretch,
will it?"

"No, indeed--nor forty-eight," answered the nurse, as she smoothed the
pillow under the little patient's head. "I shall want you fresh and
strong to help me with the 'day shift,' Smiles dear. And, as the doctor
says, orders are orders."

The girl's tired eyes suddenly filled again, this time, with hurt,
rebellious tears, and a pout, almost like a child's, appeared on her
lips as she turned and moved slowly toward the ladder in the far corner.
Donald watched her with sympathetic understanding and the thought, "She
must think me a brute"; but, before he could speak the word of
consolation which was on his tongue, she whirled about, just as she had
when sent to bed on the first night of their acquaintance, and running
back, threw herself into his arms. As she clung to him passionately,
sobbing without restraint from weariness and the break in the tension
which had kept her up for so long, she whispered, "Oh, I love you so,
dear Don. You have been so good, so good to me, and I'm so very happy."

"Well, well," answered the man huskily, as he patted her shoulder, "you
certainly have a funny way of showing it; but, after all, women are
queer creatures. I'm happy, too, dear--happy to be here and to have been
able to help you. And now," he concluded, lightly, "my happiness will be
complete if you will just let me see that sunny smile on your face, as
you obey that order which I have had to give you three times already."

The tired girl, for the moment more child than woman, leaned