jor Henri Marchand as well
as that of his older brother, the present count. Their mother might be
the loveliest lady in the world, but there was something wrong with her
sons.

Here the younger one was idling away his time about the chateau, or in
Paris, so it was said, while the count had suddenly disappeared and was
not to be found at all! Neither had been engaged in any dangerous work
on the battle front. It was all very strange.

The bouncing ambulance was swiftly out of sight of the chateau gate.
Ruth sighed.

"Say! isn't there anybody at all who can go with those supplies they're
in need of but you, Miss Ruth?" inquired Charlie Bragg, looking
sideways at her.

"No. I am alone at Clair, you know quite well, Charlie. The supplies
are entirely under my care. I can teach somebody else over there at
the bombed hospital in a short time how to handle the things.
Meanwhile, the matron--or somebody else--can do my work here. It would
not do to send a greenhorn to such a busy hospital as this must be to
which you are taking me."

"Busy! You said it!" observed the driver. "You'll see a lot of rough
stuff, Miss Ruth; and you haven't been used to that. What'll Tom
Cameron say?" and he grinned suddenly.

Ruth laughed a little. "Every tub must stand on its own bottom, Aunt
Alvirah says. I must do my duty."

"It'll be a mighty dangerous trip. I'm not fooling you. There are
places on the road---- Well! the Boches are all stirred up and they
are likely to drop a shell or two almost anywhere, you know."

"You came through it, didn't you?" she demanded pluckily.

"By the skin of my teeth," he returned.

"You're trying to scare me."

"Honest to goodness I'm not. They sent me over for the supplies and
somebody to attend to them."

"Well?" she said inquiringly, as Charlie ceased to speak.

"But I didn't think you'd have to make the trip. Isn't there anybody
else, Miss Ruth?" and the young fellow was quite earnest now.

"Nobody," she said firmly. "No use telling me anything more, Charlie.
For the very reason the trip is dangerous, you wouldn't want me to put
it off on somebody else, would you?"

He said no more. The car rattled down into the little town, with its
crooked, paved streets and its countless smells. Clair was the center
of a farming community, and, in some cases, the human inhabitants and
the dumb beasts lived very close together.

The hospital sprawled over considerable ground. It wa