t this time of night, when we want her to go to sleep!"

Mac opened his mouth to say something more, when a sneeze came upon him
unawares, and a loud "Ah rash hoo!" awoke the echoes of the quiet house.

"Why didn't you stop it?" said Phebe reproachfully. "I dare say you've
waked her up."

"Didn't know it was coming. Just my luck!" groaned Mac, turning to go
before his unfortunate presence did more harm.

But a voice from the stair-head called softly, "Mac, come up; Rose wants
to see you."

Up he went, and found his uncle waiting for him.

"What brings you here at this hour, my boy?" asked the Doctor in a
whisper.

"Charlie said it was all my fault, and if she died I'd killed her. I
couldn't sleep, so I came to see how she was, and no one knows it but
Steve," he said with such a troubled face and voice that the Doctor had
not the heart to blame him.

Before he could say anything more a feeble voice called "Mac!" and with
a hasty "Stay a minute just to please her, and then slip away, for I
want her to sleep," the Doctor led him into the room.

The face on the pillow looked very pale and childish, and the smile that
welcomed Mac was very faint, for Rose was spent with pain, yet could not
rest till she had said a word of comfort to her cousin.

"I knew your funny sneeze, and I guessed that you came to see how I did,
though it is very late. Don't be worried, I'm better now, and it is my
fault I was ill, not yours; for I needn't have been so silly as to wait
in the cold just because I said I would."

Mac hastened to explain, to load himself with reproaches, and to beg
her not to die on any account, for Charlie's lecture had made a deep
impression on the poor boy's mind.

"I didn't know there was any danger of my dying," and Rose looked up at
him with a solemn expression in her great eyes.

"Oh, I hope not; but people do sometimes go suddenly, you know, and I
couldn't rest till I'd asked you to forgive me," faltered Mac, thinking
that Rose looked very like an angel already, with the golden hair loose
on the pillow, and the meekness of suffering on her little white face.

"I don't think I shall die; uncle won't let me; but if I do, remember I
forgave you."

She looked at him with a tender light in her eyes, and, seeing how
pathetic his dumb grief was, she added softly, drawing his head down, "I
wouldn't kiss you under the mistletoe, but I will now, for I want you to
be sure I do forgive and love you just the s