“It is in helping others that we best help ourselves,” he explained. “Who labours but for himself achieves a barren life, is like the unfaithful steward with his talents. Happiness lies in labouring for your neighbour. It is a twofold happiness. For it brings its own reward in the satisfaction of achievement, in the joy of accomplishment; and it brings another in that, bending our thoughts to the needs and afflictions of our fellows, it removes them from the contemplation of the afflictions that are our own.” “Yes, yes. But how does it lie in my power now to do this?” “In several ways, my dear. I will tell you of one. By God’s mercy and the loving heroism of a fellow-creature you have been cured of the plague, and by that cure you have been rendered what is commonly known as a ‘safe woman’--a person immune from infection who may move without fear among those who suffer from the pestilence. Nurse-keepers are very difficult to find, and daily their diminishing numbers grow less equal to the ever-increasing work that this sad visitation provides. Many of them are noble, self-sacrificing women who, without even such guarantees of immunity as you now possess, go heroically among the sufferers, and some of these--alas!--are constantly succumbing.” He paused, peering at her shortsightedly through his spectacles. She looked up at him in round-eyed amusement. “And you are suggesting that I....” She broke off, a little appalled by the prospect opened out to her. “You might do it because you conceive it to be a debt you owe to God and your fellow-creatures for your own preservation. Or you might do it so that, in seeking to heal the afflictions of others, you may succeed in healing your own. But, however you did it, it would be a noble act, and would surely not go unrewarded.” She rose slowly, her brows bent in thought. Then she uttered a little laugh of self-pity. “And unless I do that, what else, indeed, am I to do?” she asked. “Nay, nay,” he made haste to reassure her. “I do not wish to force you into any course against your will. If the task is repugnant to you--and I can well understand that it might be--do not imagine that I shall on that account forsake you. I will not leave you helpless and alone. Be sure of that.” She looked at him, and smiled a little. “It is repugnant, of course,” she confessed frankly. “How should it be otherwise? I have lived soft and self-indulgently from childhood. Therefore, if I do this thing, perhaps it will on that account be more acceptable in the eyes of Heaven. As you say, it is a debt I owe.” She put out a hand and took his arm. “I am ready, my friend, to set about discharging it.” CHAPTER XXVI THE DEAD-CART