"The neighbors say we are carryin' on. They think that because you ain't a relation that's it's unconventional, them's her words, unconventional that you stay here." A pained look came into kindly John's eyes. "Why, Drusilla, I hadn't thought of that. Perhaps I'd better go." Drusilla reached over and patted his hand. "Just you set right still, John Brierly, and don't get excited. I ain't felt so young sence mother scolded me for walkin' out with you." She laughed a little happy laugh. "Why, it takes me back fifty years!" "Oh, Drusilla," murmured John. "If it makes you talked about--" "Makes me talked about! Why, who'd 'a' thought when Mis' Fisher come to mother when we was young and said that our carryin's on was disgraceful, that in fifty years another Mis' Fisher-kind would say the same thing. Oh, John, why don't you laugh?" "I don't see anything to laugh about, Drusilla." "You never had a sense of humor, John; but you was born without it. But, I tell you, it makes me young again. Why, it makes a woman old to feel she can do just as she pleases and not git talked about; and I feel I ain't got one foot in the grave to know that I can still be carryin' on--Oh, I guess, I'll go and put on my new dress that's just come home. I ain't seventy--I'm still a girl!" And, chuckling to herself, she went out of the room, followed by John's wondering eyes. He sat quietly a moment, then went back to his book, feeling that woman's reasoning was far beyond his ken. That night, as she and John were sitting down to their seven o'clock dinner, a frightened nurse came running in. "Oh, Miss Doane," she said, "one of the babies is very sick. He don't seem able to breathe." Drusilla put down her napkin and started immediately for the nursery, where she found one of the younger babies struggling for its breath, evidently in the earlier stages of pneumonia. She looked at it a moment, then said: "Now you git one of the babies' bathtubs filled with hot water and I'll be back in a minute. Have some one telephone for Dr. Eaton." She hurried to her rooms and put on a big white apron, then to the linen closet and got a piece of white flannel, and was just starting for the nursery again, when a card was brought her. She read on it: _James Carrington_. "He's part of the Committee," she said; and as she passed through the hall she went up to him. "You're Mr. Carrington," she began abruptly. "I'm real glad to see you. I know what you come for, but I ain't got time to talk now. You come with me and we'll talk afterwards." And before the chairman of the Committee could say a word he was hurried upstairs and into a small room, where a couple of frightened nurses were looking at a baby whose flushed face and labored breathing showed that he was very ill. Drusilla went to the small bathtub that was placed on the floor.