ad! You see, I needed to change so
much."

"But how has it happened?" exclaimed Cameron. "It is a miracle to me."

"How a miracle?"

For a few moments they walked on in silence, the tote road leading them
into the forest. After a time the nurse said softly,

"It was you who began it."

"I?"

"Yes, you--and then the nurse. Oh, I can never repay her! The day that
you left--that was a dreadful day. The world was all black. I could not
have lived, I think, many days like that. I had to go into town and I
couldn't help going to her. Oh, how good she was to me that day! how
good! She understood, she understood at once. She made me come for a
week to her, and then for altogether. That was the beginning; then I
began to see how foolish I had been."

"Foolish?"

"Yes, wildly foolish! I was like a mad thing, but I did not know then,
and I could not help it."

"Help what?"

"Oh, everything! But the nurse showed me--she showed me--"

"Showed you?"

"Showed me how to take care of myself--to take care of my body--of my
dress--of my hair. Oh, I remember well," she said with a bright little
laugh, "I remember that hair-dresser. Then the doctor came and gave me
books and made me read and study--and then I began to see. Oh, it was
like a fire--a burning fire within me. And the doctor was good to me,
so very patient, till I began to love my profession; to love it at first
for myself, and then for others. How good they all were to me those
days!--the nurses in the hospital, the doctors, the students--everyone
seemed to be kind; but above them all my own nurse here and my own
doctor."

In hurried eager speech she poured forth her heart as if anxious to
finish her tale--her voice, her eyes, her face all eloquent of the
intense emotion that filled her soul.

"It is wonderful!" said Cameron.

"Yes," she replied, "wonderful indeed! And I wanted to see you and have
you see me," she continued, still hurrying her speech, "for I could not
bear that you should remember me as I was those dreadful days; and I am
so glad that you--you--are pleased!" The appeal in her voice and in her
eyes roused in Cameron an overwhelming tide of passion.

"Pleased!" he cried. "Pleased! Great Heavens, Mandy! You are wonderful!
Don't you know that?"

"No," she said thoughtfully; "but," she drew a long breath, "I like to
hear you say it. That is all I want. You see I owe it all to you." The
face she turned to him so innocently happy might have bee