"O, if it is a slow fever, it might last several weeks, but I don't want
to discourage you."

"Discourage!" It was magnificent. Two or three weeks of toast and jelly
and oranges and many soft words, and not a few hugs! That night he was
dreaming of boxes of oranges he was emptying, and of glasses of jelly big
as hogsheads, out of which he was taking jelly by the shovelful! The next
morning he felt--though unwilling to confess it--much better. At noon keen
old Dr. Pillipot happened to come along, and Aunt Stanshy referred
Charlie's case to him. Old Dr. Pillipot bent his sharp, gray eyes down
toward Charlie and made up a horrid face as he growled, "Let me see your
tongue, young man. Hem! Looks quite well. Let me feel your pulse. So!
Quite good. The weather has changed, and as it is mild and sunny, he might
walk down to school this--afternoon.

"O dear!" groaned Charlie, when the doctor had left. "I wish I had scared
his horse off when I saw him coming down the lane. You and I, aunty, did
have such a nice time!"

O, the trials of this life!

Charlie, though, had a dose of comfort from Aunt Stanshy. She told him he
need not go to school until the next day, and when the morning came, she
said:

"I believe the _Neponset_ took a cargo on board in the night."

There in the shadow of the mast-head was a column of doughnuts!

"You may take them all to school with you, Charlie."