, utterly oblivious of her
surroundings, "Johnnie, you've always been my friend! Danny's sick!"

"Shandon,--for pity's sake!" ejaculated little Mrs. Larabee, reaching
out her arms for Danny, her face shocked and protesting and pitying all
at once, "Why, Shandy, you should have waited for me over at the
hotel," she said, in a lower tone, with a glance at the incongruous
scene. Then pity for the anguished face gained mastery, and she added
tenderly, "Well, you poor child, you, was this where you was walking
this afternoon? My stars, if I'd only known! Why on earth didn't you
drive?"

"I couldn't wait!" said Shandon, hoarsely. "We were out in the woods,
and Lizzie she gave Danny some mushrooms. And when I looked he--his
little mouth--" she choked. "And then he began to have sorta cramps,
and kinda doubled up, Johnnie, and he cried so queer, and I jest
started up here on a run. He--JOHNNIE!" terror shook her voice when she
saw the other's face, "Johnnie, is he going to die?" she said.

"Mushrooms!" echoed Mrs. Larabee, gravely, shaking her head. And a
score of other women looking over her shoulder at the child, who lay
breathing heavily with his eyes shut, shook their heads, too.

"You'd better take him right home with me, dearie," Mrs. Larabee said
gently, with a significant glance at the watching circle. "We oughtn't
to lose any time."

Dr. Lowell stepped out beside her and gently took Danny in his arms.

"I hope you'll let me carry him over there for you, Mrs. Waters," said
he. "There's no question that he's pretty sick. We've got a hard fight
ahead."

There was a little sensation in the room, but Shandon only looked at
him uncomprehendingly. In her eyes there was the dumb thankfulness of
the dog who knows himself safe with friends. She wet her lips and tried
to speak. But before she could do so, the doctor's mother touched his
arm half timidly and said:

"Arnold, you can't very well--surely, it's hardly fair to Mary--"

"Mary--?" he answered her quickly. He raised his eyes to where his
wife-to-be, in a startled group of white-clad attendants, was standing
halfway down the stairway.

She looked straight at Shandon, and perhaps at no moment in their lives
did the two women show a more marked contrast; Shandon muddy,
exhausted, haggard, her sombre eyes sick with dread, Mary's always
fragile beauty more ethereal than ever under the veil her mother had
just caught back with orange blossoms. Shandon involuntarily