“Exactly. We’ll make a trained nurse of you, yet, Junkum,” approved the Health Master. “Then,” said Julia slowly, “I think Bobs ought to wash his hands now. Mother opened the door after handling Charley’s glass, and when he went to watch her wash the glass, he put his hand on the knob.” “One mark against Bobs,” announced the doctor. “The rigor of the game.” A game it proved to be, with Charley for umpire, and a very keen umpire, as he was the beneficiary of the penalties. For some days Charley quite fattened on literature dispensed orally by the incautious. Presently, however, they became so wary that it was hard to catch them. Then, indeed, was the doctor hard put to it to keep the invalid amused. The children invented games and charades for him. A special telephone wire was run to his room so that he might talk with his friends. Bobs won commendations by flying a kite one windy day and passing the twine up through Charley’s window, whereby the bedridden one spent a happy afternoon “feeling her pull.” And the next day Betty won the first and only dollar by discovering a small and early fly which, presumably, had crawled in by the hole bored for the kite twine. As to any encroachments upon the physical quiet of his patient or the protective guardianship surrounding him, the Health Master was adamant, until, on a day, after examining the prisoner’s throat and nose, and going over him, as Mr. Clyde put it, “like a man buying a horse that’s cheaper than he ought to be,” he sent for the Health Officer. “It’s a clean throat,” said Dr. Merritt. “Never mind the desquamating skin. We’ll call it off.” Whereupon Charley was raised from his bed, and having symbolically broken the tape-line about his bed, headed a solemn and slow procession of the entire family to the front porch where he formally took down the red placard and tore it in two. The halves still ornament the playroom, as a memento. After this memorable ceremony, Mrs. Clyde retired to the library and, quite contrary to her usually self-restrained nature, dissolved into illogical tears, in which condition she was found by the rest. “I—I—I don’t know what’s the matter,” she sobbed, in response to her husband’s inquiry. “It’s just because I hated the very thought of that abominable red sign so,—as if we were unclean—like lepers.” “Well, we’re not lepers and if we can continue in that blessed state,” remarked Dr. Strong cheerfully, “we can escape most of the ills that flesh is heir to. After all, from a scientific point of view, contagion is merely the Latin synonym for a much shorter and uglier word.” “Which is—” queried Mr. Clyde. “Dirt,” said the Health Master. VIII. HOPE FOR THE HOPELESS “Hopeless from the first,” said old Mrs. Sharpless, with a sigh, to her daughter. Mrs. Clyde nodded. “I suppose so. And she has so much to live for, too.”