and held a glass of water to her lips. Then she
regained breath.

"They are in the small-pox ward, but they haven't the disease. Ah! they
are there, they are there. Come at once and take them away. Ah! take
them away this minute."

"By 'they' do you mean Perley and Sprague?" Jones asked, breathlessly.

"Yes, ah, yes. Thank God! thank God! Ah! I could say prayers from now
until my dying day. But, oh, Mr. Jones, do, do hurry; because they may
die if we do not get them away from that dreadful pest-house."

"It will take some time to get the order for the removal. Meanwhile,
they will need good nursing. If you hope to help them you must be calm;
you must keep well. Now go to your brother. It is just as well that Miss
Sprague went away this morning. Before she comes back, her brother will
be in a place she can visit with safety. You can not go back there. You
must remain patient now until I get them away from that
dangerous place."

It was not until the next day that the red tape of the establishment was
so far cut as to warrant the surgeon in charge in making a personal
inspection of the two invalids. He at once, and in indignant
astonishment, pronounced the two untouched by the disease set against
their names in their papers of admission. Early in the afternoon they
were carried on a stretcher to a clean, fresh tent on the sandy beach,
where the laurel bushes almost ran into the water. Letters had been
dispatched to Olympia in forming her that Jack was found, and urging her
to come on at once. The next evening the three ladies arrived--Mrs.
Sprague, Olympia, and Kate. With them they brought a renowned physician
who had been uniformly successful in treating maladies of the sort the
lads were described as suffering.

Days of painful anxiety followed. Once, all hope of Dick was abandoned,
and his aunts were telegraphed for. But, in the end, he opened his big
blue eyes, sane and convalescent. There was rapid mending after this,
you may be sure. Kate had, through Olympia's unobtrusive manoeuvring,
been forced to bear the burden of Jack's nursing, and, somehow, when
that impatient warrior mingled amorous pleadings with his early
consciousness, she forgot upon which side the burden of repentance and
forgiving lay. She listened with gentle serenity to his protestations,
checking him only by the threat to quit the place and return to
her father.

During all this, Rosa was divided in her mind. She resented the
assiduity of