you be scart. I've seen folks enough worse than your mother git well."

In the last few hours Maria's face had gotten a hard look. She no
longer seemed like a little girl. After a while the doctors went away.

"I don't suppose there is much they can do for a while, perhaps,"
remarked Mrs. White; "and Miss Bell, she is as good as any doctor."

Both physicians returned a little after noon, and previously Mrs.
Edgham had made her voice of lamentation heard again. Then it ceased
abruptly, but there was no odor of chloroform.

"They are giving her morphine now, I bet a cooky," Mrs. White said.
She, with Maria, was clearing away the dinner-table then. "What time
do you think your aunt Maria will get here?" she asked.

"About half-past two, father said," replied Maria.

"Well, I'm real glad you've got some one like her you can call on,"
said Mrs. White. "Somebody that 'ain't ever had no family, and 'ain't
tied. Now I'd be willin' to stay right along myself, but I couldn't
leave Lillian any length of time. She 'ain't never had anything hard
put on her, and she 'ain't any too tough. But your aunt can stay
right along till your mother gits well, can't she?"

"I guess so," replied Maria.

There was something about Maria's manner which made Mrs. White
uneasy. She forced conversation in order to make her speak, and do
away with that stunned look on her face. All the time now Maria was