d, with a kindly smile into Elizabeth's tired face.
"Is it your sister?"

"No--hers." Elizabeth indicated Peggy, who twisted her bare feet
nervously one over the other as the doctor looked her over. "They live
at Slabtown," Elizabeth added.

"O--at Slabtown. And where do you live?"

"I'm--we," Elizabeth's gesture included Olga, "we are at the camp."

"And how came you mixed up in this business?" The doctor meant to know
all about the affair now. When Elizabeth had told him, he looked at her
curiously. "And so you lugged that heavy child all the way down here?"
he said.

"Olga wanted to carry her, but the baby wouldn't let her--and she was
crying, so----" Elizabeth's voice trailed off into silence.

The doctor smiled at her again. Then suddenly he inquired in a gruff
voice, "Well now, who's going to pay me for this job--you?"

"_O!_" cried Elizabeth, her eyes suddenly very anxious. "I--I never
thought of that. It was hurting her so--and she's so little--I just
thought--thought----" Again she left her sentence unfinished.

"What's her name? Who's her father?" the doctor demanded.

Peggy answered, "Father's Jim Johnson. I guess mebbe he'll pay
you--sometime."

The doctor's face changed. He remembered when Jim Johnson's wife died a
year before--he remembered the three children now.

"There's nothing to pay," he said kindly, "only be careful how you pull
your little sister around by the arms after this. Some children can
stand that sort of handling, but she can't."

"O, thank you!" Elizabeth's eyes full of gratitude were lifted to the
old doctor's face as she spoke. He rose, and looking down at her, laid a
kindly hand on her shoulder.

"That camp's a good place for you. Stay there as long as you can," he
said. "But don't lug a three-year-old a mile and a half again. You are
hardly strong enough yet for that kind of athletics."

They all filed out then, and Elizabeth put little Polly John into the
soapbox wagon, kissed the small face, dirty and tear-stained as it was,
and stood for a moment looking after the three children as they set off
towards Slabtown.

As they went on to the camp, Olga kept glancing at Elizabeth in silent
wonder. Was this really the Poor Thing who could not do anything--who
would barely answer "yes" or "no" when any one spoke to her? Olga
watched her in puzzled silence.

V

WIND AND WEATHER

Olga, sitting under a big oak, was embroidering her ceremonial dress,
and, as usua