mother and you think me--not by any means good
enough, of course, not that, but not too impatient, sarcastic, and
trifling to be a nurse," said Annie brightly, addressing her father, who
simply acquiesced in an absent-minded fashion.

After that there was no serious objection made to Annie's wish, great as
the wonder was at first--a shock to her relations no less than to her
acquaintances. The former reconciled themselves sooner to it than did
the latter, with an entire faith in Annie and an affectionate admiration
which was genuine homage. It swelled Dora's heart well-nigh to bursting
with sister-worship. How good Annie was showing herself, how capable of
great acts of self-denial and self-consecration, while she was prettier
than ever with her graceful head, her merry brown eyes, and that soft,
warm colour of hers!

Only Mrs. Millar lay awake at night and cried quietly over what lay
before her young daughter, her first-born, the flower of the flock, as
people had called her in reference to her beauty. Annie's pretty
Grand-aunt Penny had at least enjoyed her day; she had had her triumph,
however short-lived, in marrying the man of her heart, who was also a
Beauchamp of Waylands, and in being raised for even a brief space to the
charmed circle of the county. What she had to go through--whether she
would or not--in the end, was not worse than Annie was proposing to
encounter in the beginning, to live in an hospital, to spend her
blooming life amidst frightful accidents, raging fevers, the spasm of
agony replaced by the chill silence and stillness of death. Annie's
father's time and strength had been given in much the same cause, ever
since he was a young man passing his examinations and taking his
diploma. But he was a man, which changed the whole aspect of affairs;
besides he had always had a cheerful home to come back to, with the
command of all the social advantages which Redcross, his native town,
could afford. He had not lived among his patients with no life to speak
of separate from theirs.

At the same time Mrs. Millar felt herself powerless. She dared no more
interfere to keep back Annie from her calling than a good Roman Catholic
mother would forbid her daughter's "vocation."

CHAPTER VIII.

STANDING AND WAITING.

It was all over in its earlier stages, that dividing and dispersing of
the goodly young group of sisters, that bereaving and impoverishing of
the abandoned home to which Dora and May ha