ger of its spreading much. And
you know how it is. The Rookeries have got a bad name, anyway. Anything
starting there is sure to be exaggerated. Why, look at that chicken-pox
epidemic a few years ago."

"I understand nobody who had been vaccinated got any of the chicken-pox,
as you call it."

"That's as may be. What did it amount to, anyway? Nothing. Yet it almost
ruined Old Home Week."

"Naturally you don't want the Centennial Home Week endangered. But we
don't want the health of the city endangered."

"'We.' Who's we?"

"Well, the 'Clarion.'"

"Don't work the guardian-of-the-people game on me, my boy. And don't
worry about the city's health. If this starts to spread we'll take
measures."

By no means satisfied with this interview, McGuire Ellis left the
Certina plant, and almost ran into Dr. Elliot, whom he hailed, for he
had the faculty of knowing everybody.

"Not doing any doctoring nowadays, are you?"

"No," retorted the other. "Doing any sickening, yourself?"

Ellis grinned. "It's despairing weariness that makes me look this way.
I'm up against a tougher job than old Diogenes. I'm looking for an
honest doctor."

"You fish in muddy waters," commented his acquaintance, glancing up at
the Certina Building.

"There's something very wrong down in the Twelfth Ward."

"Not going in for reform politics, are you?"

"This isn't political. Some kind of disease has broken out in
O'Farrell's Rookeries."

"Delirium tremens," suggested Dr. Elliot.

"Yes: that's a funny joke," returned the other, unmoved; "but did you
ever hear of any one sneaking D-T cases across the county line at night
to a pest-house run by a political friend of O'Farrell's?"

"Can't say I have."

"Or burying the dead in quicklime?"

"Quicklime? What's this, 'Clarion' sensationalism?"

"Don't be young. I'm telling you. Quicklime. Canadaga County."

Not only had Dr. Elliot served his country in the navy, but he had done
duty in that efficient fighting force, which reaps less honor and
follows a more noble, self-sacrificing and courageous ideal than any
army or navy, the United States Public Health Service. Under that banner
he had fought famines, panic, and pestilence, from the stricken
lumber-camps of the North, to the pent-in, quarantined bayous of the
South; and now, at the hint of danger, there came a battle-glint into
his sharp eyes.

"Tell me what you know."

"Now you're talking!" said the newspaper man. "It's little enoug