terror. To them, as to
the masses everywhere, the hospital meant almost certain death;
for they assumed--and they had heard again and again
accusations which warranted it--that the public hospital
doctors and nurses treated their patients with neglect always,
with downright inhumanity often. Not a day passed without
their hearing some story of hospital outrage upon poverty,
without their seeing someone--usually some child--who was
paying a heavy penalty for having been in the charity wards.

Einstein understood their expression. "Nonsense!" said he
gruffly. "You girls look too sensible to believe those silly lies."

Susan looked at him steadily. His eyes shifted. "Of course, the
pay service _is_ better," said he in a strikingly different tone.

"How much would it be at a pay hospital?" asked Susan.

"Twenty-five a week including my services," said Doctor
Einstein. "But you can't afford that."

"Will he get the best treatment for that?"

"The very best. As good as if he were Rockefeller or the big
chap uptown."

"In advance, I suppose?"

"Would we ever get our money out of people if we didn't get it
in advance? We've got to live just the same as any other class."

"I understand," said the girl. "I don't blame you. I don't
blame anybody for anything." She said to Clara, "Can you lend
me twenty?"

"Sure. Come in and get it." When she and Susan were in the
hall beyond Einstein's hearing, she went on: "I've got the
twenty and you're welcome to it. But--Lorna hadn't you
better----"

"In the same sort of a case, what'd _you_ do?" interrupted Susan.

Clara laughed. "Oh--of course." And she gave Susan a roll of
much soiled bills--a five, the rest ones and twos.

"I can get the ambulance to take him free," said Einstein.
"That'll save you five for a carriage."

She accepted this offer. And when the ambulance went, with
Spenser burning and raving in the tightly wrapped blankets,
Susan followed in a street car to see with her own eyes that he
was properly installed. It was arranged that she could visit
him at any hour and stay as long as she liked.

She returned to the tenement, to find the sentiment of the
entire neighborhood changed toward her. Not loss of money, not
loss of work, not dispossession nor fire nor death is the
supreme calamity among the poor, but sickness. It is their
most frequent visitor--sickness in all its many frightful
forms--rheumatism and consumption, cancer and t