moping about by herself all summer had been making herself useful.

"I'm ashamed," she thought. "Madeleine and Judith and Otoyo all make me feel awfully ashamed."

In the meantime, Mrs. Murphy had spread a cloth on the little kitchen table and laid out her best cups and saucers. It was her heart's delight to drink tea with the young ladies.

"And how is the poor gintleman, Mr. Edwin, I mean?"

"He's getting better every day, Mrs. Murphy."

"And I'm that glad to hear the news. It would have been a sad day for the poor young lady if she had lost him—though, may the Howly Mother forgive me for saying it, she's not good enough for the loikes of him, I'm thinkin'."

"Let me pour the tea for you, Mrs. Murphy," Molly interposed, taking the blue teapot out of Mrs. Murphy's crippled hands after it had been filled with boiling water. "What young lady did you say it was?" she asked presently, her eyes on a tea leaf swirling round and round in her cup.

"'Tis Miss Fern, the gintleman's cousin, and they do say they're to be married before spring. I'm not for sayin' she ain't pretty, Miss. She's prettier than most and she's kind to the gintleman. Oh, you may be sure but she's got a different set of manners for him! And the day she had tea here with little Miss Sen and the Professor, she was all graces, to be sure. But another day she was here to meet him and little Miss Sen brought the message he could not come. It was a regular spitfire she was that day, Miss, and no mistake."

So that was why the Professor had wanted the blue paper weight. Perhaps there was some reason in his delirium after all.

"Have you seen her, Miss?" asked Mrs. Murphy.

"Oh, yes," answered Molly. "I think she is very pretty. May I look at your garden, Mrs. Murphy? Dear little Otoyo, I can see her working out here in the flowers. Don't you just love her, Mrs. Murphy?"

But the Irish woman had gone into the next room to get an old pair of shears.

"I'll take it as a favor, Miss Molly, if you'll cut two bunches, one for yourself and one for the Professor, God bless him and the Saints preserve him for strength and happiness; though I ain't sayin' I wish him to be preserved for Miss Alice Fern, pretty though she be."

When Molly appeared at the hospital some half an hour later she made a picture the infirmary nurse would not soon forget.

"These are for Professor Green from Mrs. Murphy," Molly said, giving the nurse the largest half of the bunch.

The nurse gave her a long quizzical look. She was new at Wellington and not familiar with the girls.

"Are you Miss Molly Brown?" she asked suddenly.

"Why, yes," answered Molly, surprised.

"I thought so," said the nurse, and departed before the astonished Molly could say another word.

Contents

CHAPTER IV

THE SENIOR RAMBLE.