"That's jest the thing for her. I'll get out the kettle and put it on to heat. I dun'no' of anything that gits cold any quicker than lamb broth, unless it's love." Amanda put on a cheerful air as she helped Mrs. Field. Presently the two women carried in the little repast to Lois. "She's asleep," whispered Amanda, who went first with the tea. They stood looking at the young girl, stretched out her slender length, her white delicate profile showing against the black arm of the sofa. Her mother caught her breath. "She's got to be waked up; she's got to have some nourishment, anyhow," said she. "Come, Lois, wake up, and have your dinner." Lois opened her eyes. All the animation and defiance were gone from her face. She was so exhausted that she made no resistance to anything. She let them raise her, prop her up with a pillow, and nearly feed her with the dinner. Then she lay back, and her eyes closed. Amanda went home, and Mrs. Field went back to the kitchen to put away the dinner dishes. She had eaten nothing herself, and now she poured some of the broth into a cup, and drank it down with great gulps without tasting it. It was simply filling of a necessity the lamp of life with oil. After her housework was done, she sat down in the kitchen with her knitting. There was no sound from the other room. The latter part of the afternoon Amanda came past the window and entered the back door. She carried a glass of foaming beer. Amanda was famous through the neighborhood for this beer, which she concocted from roots and herbs after an ancient recipe. It was pleasantly flavored with aromatic roots, and instinct with agreeable bitterness, being an innocently tonic old-maiden brew. "I thought mebbe she'd like a glass of my beer," whispered Amanda. "I came round the house so's not to disturb her. How is she?" "I guess she's asleep. I ain't heard a sound." Amanda set the glass on the table. "Don't you think you'd ought to have a doctor, Mis' Field?" said she. It seemed impossible that Lois could have heard, but her voice came shrilly from the other room: "No, I ain't going to have a doctor; there's no need of it. I sha'n't like it if you get one, mother." "No, you sha'n't have one, dear child," her mother called back. "She was always jest so about havin' a doctor," she whispered to Amanda. "I'll take in the beer if she's awake," said Amanda. Lois looked up when she entered. "I don't want a doctor," said she, pitifully, rolling her blue eyes. "Of course you sha'n't have a doctor if you don't want one," returned Amanda, soothingly. "I thought mebbe you'd like a glass of my beer." Lois drank the beer eagerly, then she sank back and closed her eyes. "I'm going to get up in a minute, and sew on my dress," she murmured. But she did not stir until her mother helped her to bed early in the evening.