At last there came a day on which the doctor said that without risk Maudie might be taken to see Hoodie--only to see her--there was no thought of her speaking to Hoodie, or Hoodie to her, for the little girl was lying in a stupor--quite quiet and unconscious, and out of this stupor, though he did not say so, Dr. Reynolds had but little hope of her waking to life again. The fever had let her go at last, had thrown her down, as it were, careless of how she fell, and the poor little shaken worn-out Hoodie that it had left there, white and thin and lifeless, hardly seemed as if it _could_ ever rouse up again to live and talk and play--and there was nothing to do but to wait. So Maudie was carried into the room where this unfamiliar Hoodie was lying, and allowed to look at her poor little face and to cry quietly to herself as she looked. In whose arms, children, do you think she was carried? It was in Magdalen's. When she heard of the trouble that had fallen over her little friends she could not rest till she came to them. She had had the fever long ago, she wrote; she was so strong that nursing never made her ill or tired--she could sit up a whole week of nights without being knocked up. But when she arrived she found that in the way of actual nursing there was little to do. Hoodie lay still and lifeless--all the restlessness gone; for her indeed, it seemed to Magdalen, there would never again be anything to do, no care and tenderness to bestow--and the thought brought burning tears to poor Magdalen's eyes, though she bravely drove them back, and did her best to comfort Maudie and her mother. "Cousin Magdalen," said Maudie, when they had sat for a few minutes by Hoodie's bed, "Cousin Magdalen, can't we do _anything_ to make her better? Oh, dear, dear little Hoodie, oh, how I wish I had never been the least bit not kind to her." Then raising herself in her cousin's arms, she knelt on her lap, and leaning her head on Magdalen's shoulder, she said, while her voice was broken with sobs-- "Oh, dear God, _please_ make Hoodie better. We do so love her--and she doesn't know how we love her, because I've been unkind to her sometimes. Oh, dear God, _please_ make her better." And then, her voice changing a little, as if she were afraid that her simple entreaty was hardly solemn enough to be considered "prayer," she added, like Hoodie, "For Jesus Christ's sake. Amen." A slight movement just then made itself heard in Hoodie's cot; a flutter more than anything else. Magdalen, gently putting Maudie on her chair, started up in alarm. She knew that any change in Hoodie was now most critical. She bent over the child, the better to observe her. A faint smile came fluttering to Hoodie's face, and in another moment, with a little effort, she opened her eyes. But she did not seem to see, or if she saw, she did not recognize, Magdalen, for the word that she whispered was "Maudie." Low as it was Maudie heard it.