Hannah needed no second bidding to run, and half an hour later she was domesticated with a colored family who lived not far from the Hill. Thus left to themselves, Louis and John, together with the physician, did what they could for the sick man, who at last proposed sending for Maude, feeling intuitively that she would not desert him as his own child had done. Silent, desolate, and forsaken the old house looked as Maude approached it, and she involuntarily held her breath as she stepped into the hall, whose close air seemed laden with infection. She experienced no difficulty in finding the sick-room, where Louis' cry of delight, John's expression of joy, and the sick man's whispered words, "God bless you, Maude," more than recompensed her for the risk she had incurred. Gradually her fear subsided, particularly when she learned that it was in fact the varioloid. Had it been possible to remove her brother from danger she would have done so, but it was too late now, and she suffered him to share her vigils, watching carefully for the first symptoms of the disease in him. In this manner nearly two weeks passed away, and the panic-stricken villagers were beginning to breathe more freely, when it was told them one day that Maude and Louis were both smitten with the disease. Then indeed the more humane said to themselves, "Shall they be left to suffer alone?" and still no one was found who dared to breathe the air of the sick-room. Dr. Kennedy was by this time so much better that Louis was taken to his apartment, where he ministered to him himself, while the heroic Maude was left to the care of John. Everything he could do for her he did, but his heart sunk within him when he saw how fast her fever came on, and heard her, in her sleep, mourn for her mother, to hold her aching head. "She mustn't die," he said, and over his dark skin the tears rolled like rain, as raising his eyes to the ceiling he cried imploringly, "Will the good Father send someone to help?"