"You cuddle right down there, Gail Clarenden, if you want to get well at
all. If you're real careful you'll be all right in a day or two. Let's
wait for Uncle Esmond to come home before we start any worries."

It was in her voice, girl or woman, that comforting note that could
always soothe me.

"Mat, won't you try to get them to let me go?" I pleaded.

She made no promises, but busied herself with getting my foot into its
place again, singing softly to herself all the while. Then she read me
stories from our few story-books till I fell asleep.

It was twilight when I wakened. Where I lay I could hear Esmond
Clarenden and Aunty Boone talking in the kitchen, and I listened eagerly
to all they said.

"But it's no place for a woman," my uncle was urging, gravely.

"I ain't a woman, I'm a cook. You want cooks if you eats. Mat ain't a
woman, she's a girl. But she's stronger 'n Beverly. If you can't leave
him, how can you leave her? An' Gail never get well if he's left here,
Cla'n'den, now he's got the goin' fever. Never! An' if you never got
back--"

"I don't believe he would get well, either." Then Uncle Esmond spoke
lower and I could not hear any more.

Pretty soon Mat and Beverly burst open the door and came dancing in
together, the sweet air of the warm April evening coming in with them,