y came
only because I brought them into the world. I am responsible for them--I
am responsible for them," she repeated passionately; and a moment later,
she prayed softly: "O Lord, help me to want to do what is right."

Through the night, tired and sore as she was, she hardly closed her
eyes, and she was lying wide awake, with her hand on the railing of
Jenny's crib, and her gaze on the half-bared bough of the old mulberry
tree in the street, when a cry, or less than a cry, a small, choking
whimper, from the nursery, caused her to spring out of bed with a start
and slip into her wrapper which lay across the edge of the quilt.

"I'm coming, darling," she called softly, and the answer came back in
Harry's voice: "Mamma, I'm afraid!"

Without waiting to put on her slippers, for one of them had slid under
the bed, she ran across the carpet and through the doorway into the
adjoining room.

"What is it, my lamb? Does anything hurt you?" she asked anxiously.

"I'm afraid, mamma."

"What are you afraid of? Mamma is here, precious."

His little hands were hot when she clasped them, and the pathetic wonder
in his blue eyes made her heart stand still with a fear greater than
Harry's. Ever since the children had come she had lived in terror of a
serious illness attacking them.

"Where does it hurt you, darling? Can't you tell me?"

"It feels so funny when I swallow, mamma. It's all full of flannel."

"Will you open your mouth wide, then, and let mamma mop your throat with
turpentine?"

But Harry hated turpentine even more than he hated the sore throat, and
he protested with tears while she found the bottle in the bathroom and
swathed the end of the wire mop in cotton. When she brought it to his
bedside, he fought so strenuously that she was obliged at last to give
up. His fever had excited him, and he sobbed violently while she
applied the bandages to his throat and chest.

"Is it any better, dear?" she asked desperately at the end of an hour in
which he had lain, weeping and angry, in her arms.

"It feels funny. I don't like it," he sobbed, pushing her from him.

"Then I'll send for Doctor Fraser. He'll make you well."

But he didn't want Doctor Fraser, who gave the meanest medicines. He
didn't want anybody. He hated everybody. He hated Lucy. He hated Jenny.
When at last day came, and Marthy appeared to know what Virginia wanted
for breakfast, he was still vowing passionately that he hated them all.

"Marthy, ru