abundantly to the fore. She had tact,
she had courage, she had nerve. She was also absolutely unselfish. Self
was not in the foreground with her; the work which she had to do, the
work which she meant to carry through in the best possible manner, in
the bravest spirit, with the most conscientious sense of duty, ever
filled her mental horizon. Sister Kate began to trust Effie. She began
to smile at her now and then, and to give her not quite so much
floor-scrubbing and grate-polishing, and a little more work to do for
the patients themselves.

The patients liked to call Effie to smooth their sheets, to turn their
pillows, to give them their drinks. One or two of them, when they had an
odd moment, began to make little confidences to her. She learned their
histories almost at a glance. She also studied their fancies; she began
to find out the exact way Mrs. Robinson liked her gruel flavored, and
how Mrs. Guiers liked her pillows arranged. Effie made no fuss over the
patients,--fuss and favoritism were strongly against the rules,--but
notwithstanding, she was a favorite herself.

More than one pair of tired eyes looked at her with longing and
refreshment as she passed, and more than one pair of wearied lips smiled
when she came near.

Two months went by in this fashion--very, very quickly, as such busy
months must. It was found impossible to allow Effie to go home every
Sunday, but she went, as a rule, every second one.

Things seemed to be going fairly straight at home. The extravagance she
had noticed on her first Sunday was not repeated to the same extent.
Mrs. Staunton seemed decidedly better, and Effie gave herself up with a
thankful heart to her work.

It was now the middle of winter, close upon Christmas-time. The weather
outside was bitterly cold, although, in the ward, Effie scarcely felt
this. She wore her neat lilac print dress just the same in winter as in
summer.

One day, about a week before Christmas, when a thick yellow fog was
shutting out all the view from the high ward windows, Effie was doing
something for No. 47, a poor, tired-looking woman of the name of Martin,
when Lawson, the young medical student, came suddenly into the ward. He
had been sent by the house physician to take notes on a certain case.
This case happened to be the very one which Effie was attending. When he
saw Effie a peculiar expression passed over his face. It was against the
strictest of all rules for the medical students eve