There came a severe winter and an epidemic of sickness among the children of the town; but this school escaped except for these two. She was first to succumb, and for two weeks her place was vacant--two weeks of utter wretchedness and misery for the boy, during which he could not study, nor recite, nor even remember on call the lessons he had learned. He could feel and suffer to the utmost; but, unformed, untrained, unschooled in tact, diplomacy, or any of the amenities of adult life, he could not even arouse himself to ask of her, or to take his mother into his confidence and obtain the relief of knowing the worst. It was not that his emotions took the form of anxiety so much as they crystallized into a sense of loss--a sense of something taken from him, that he could neither find nor name. One morning he saw her in her seat, pale and wan and thin, and the sense of loss left him. He was content now that she was near him, and fretted no more, even suppressing a curiosity as to the nature of her sickness. Then came his turn; two weeks in bed, fevered and delirious at times, thinking of her in lucid moments, talking of her to a puzzled mother when the delirium gripped him, and surviving at last through careful nursing, to return to his seat in school as pale and thin as was the girl. One glance he took, and his content came back. She paid him no attention, not even joining the others in the friendly looks of welcome he received, and he took up his studies at the foot of all the classes--with his divinity just above him. "It is rather funny," commented one class teacher, with a smile, "that the two best scholars are at the foot. Johnny Bridge went behind when Zenie Malcolm was sick, and Zenie Malcolm went behind when Johnny Bridge was sick. You two must study and catch up." He felt a curious elation, but did not look at her; so he did not notice that her cheeks were flaming red.