The resolute look on her face relaxes a little. She looks up to this quiet, clear-headed captain much as Lulu does; has great respect for his judgment; wishes sometimes that he were her brother, too--that her tired young heart might rest against his brave and grand strength. He sees the half-relenting in her face, and desists for fear of saying too much. "Two death-beds!" Mrs. Clendenon echoes. "Why, Allie Winters was only taken ill last night, and you have been nursing her ever since. Gracie, you don't mean to tell me that Allie Winters is dead--so soon!" "She died this evening with her arms about my neck," Grace answers, in low, pained tones. "She had the fever in its worst and most rapid form." "Ah, me, that poor child! So young, so sweet, so beautiful, and scarcely sixteen, I think. Was it not hard to be taken away from this bright world so young?" sighed Mrs. Clendenon. "Well, opinions may differ as to that," Mrs. Winans answers, half bitterly. "The most fervent prayer I breathed over her still form was one of thankfulness that she was taken perhaps from 'evil to come.' She was the last of the family. They have all died with the fever. She was poor, and almost friendless--beautiful--and beauty is often the cause of poverty. Had she lived her life must inevitably have been a sad one. Better, perhaps, that she is at rest." She pushes back her chair, folds her napkin, and makes a motion to rise. Mrs. Clendenon remonstrates. "Gracie, you have not taken a mouthful, child." "No, but I have taken my cocoa. Andrew," sinking listlessly back into her chair, and speaking to the white-aproned waiter, "you may give me another cup." "There seems to be no abatement of the fever?" she says, interrogatively, to the captain, as she balances her spoon on the edge of her cup. "On the contrary," his grave face growing graver, "the number of victims is daily augmented." Her grieved sigh is echoed by Mrs. Clendenon's as they rise from the table. The next moment a sharp rap sounds at the door. Andrew opens it, admitting Doctor Constant himself--fine-looking, noble, with the snows of sixty earnest winters on his head and on the beautiful beard flowing over his breast--genial, cheerful, gentle, as a physician should always be--he makes a bow to our three friends, but declines to be seated at all. "I have but a moment. I came out of my rounds to make sure that Mrs. Winans does not go out to-night," and as an eager remonstrance formed itself on her lip, he said, resolutely: "It is no use; you must not think of going. It is imperative that you should sleep. You are not more than half alive now." "But, doctor, there are so many who need me," she says, with a last endeavor to go.