hink
about the discovery she had just made. It made her heart-sick because it
added so immeasurably to the weight of Jack's misfortune.

"Oh, _why_ did it have to be?" she demanded again of fate. "It is too
cruel that everything the dear boy wanted most should be denied him."

With her thoughts centred gloomily on his injuries, it seemed almost an
insult for the sun to shine or for any one to be happy, and she was in
no mood to meet any one in a different humour from her own. Added to
her dull misery on Jack's account, was a baffled, disappointed feeling
that she had not been the comfort to him she had hoped to be. True, she
was learning to give him the massage he needed with almost as skilful a
touch as the nurse, but she could not see that she had eased his burden
mentally, in the least, although she had tried faithfully to carry out
the good friar's suggestion. It seemed so hard, when she was ready to
make any sacrifice for him, no matter how great, even to exchanging her
strength for his helplessness, that the means should be denied her.

While she sat there, longing for some great Angel of Opportunity to open
the way for her to help him, a little one was coming in at the back
gate, so disguised that she did not recognize it as such. She was even
impatient at the interruption. Norman, followed by a half grown Mexican
boy trundling a wheel-barrow, came up from the barn, with a whole train
of smaller boys running along-side, to support the chicken coop he was
wheeling. Norman's face shone with importance, and he called excitedly
as he fumbled at the gate latch, "Look, Mary! You can't guess what we've
got in this box! A young wild-cat! Lupe wants to sell him."

"For mercy's sake, Norman Ware," she answered, impatiently, "haven't we
enough trouble now without your bringing home a wild-cat to add to them?
And _now_, of all times!"

The tone carried even more disapproval than her words. It seemed to
insinuate that if he had the proper sympathy for Jack he would not be
thinking of anything else but his affliction. Instantly the bright face
clouded, and in an injured tone he began to explain:

"I thought brother would like to see it, and he could make the trade for
me. He talks Mexican, and I only know a few words, I couldn't make the
boys understand more than that they were to bring it along. I don't see
why Jack's being sick should keep me from having a nice pet like a
wild-cat. He isn't a bit mean, and I haven't had