little operation."

"An' how much will that cost?" asked Mrs. Gray.

"Oh," he replied, "not over fifty dollars--fifty dollars will cover
it."

"An' if she don't go?"

"She'll never get well." Then, as a dismissal of the subject, the
doctor, turning to Bob, asked: "Well, youngster, what's the outlook
for fur next season?"

"We hopes there'll be some, sir."

"Get some silver foxes. Good silvers are worth five hundred dollars
cash in St. Johns."

The mail boat steamed away with the doctor, and Bob and his mother,
with Emily made as comfortable as possible in the bottom of the boat,
turned homeward.

It was hard to realize that Emily would never be well again, that she
would never romp over the rocks with Bob in the summer or ride with
him on the sledge when he took the dogs to haul wood in the winter.
There would be no more merry laughter as she played about the cabin.
This was before the days when the mission doctors with their ships and
hospitals came to the Labrador to give back life to the sick and dying
of the coast. Fifty dollars was more money than any man of the bay
save Douglas Campbell had ever seen, and to expect to get such a sum