facts. Things in the manner of reports to a fellow committee woman. 

 Mrs. Fielding received the first as she was in the hands of the reception committee. 

 “Marjorie has measles. No cause for alarm,” it said. She frowned. Why should they bother her with trifles. 

 About noon she received another message. It read: “Patient's condition unchanged. No cause for alarm.”  

 She crumpled it in her hand and threw it on the floor. It had interrupted an inspiring conversation on the Higher Life. 

 When the doctor visited Marjorie about noon he sat fully five minutes with her, which was unusually long for such a busy man, and as he left he gravely remarked that he would drop in during the evening. 

 He did not like the way those red spots were fading. 

 When he returned he frowned. Mr. Fielding was sitting on the cribside holding one of Marjorie's hot hands and gently passing his fingers over her brow. The private secretary was on her knees at the other side of the crib. But the doctor did not frown at either of these. 

 “I don't like her condition, at all,” he said. “Not at all. But I'll try to pull her through. Telephone my wife I'll not be home to-night, will you?” Marjorie lay in open-eyed listlessness, staring upward at nothing. Her breath was short and rapid, and her heart beat like the quick strokes of a trip hammer. 

 She wondered vaguely why this strange thing was happening to her, and when the private secretary touched her she tried to smile, and only succeeded in making white lines about her drawn, dry lips. 

 It was nine o'clock when Mrs. Fielding arose to read her paper before the national convention, and as she arose she was handed a telegram. It was from the committee. 

 “Patient seriously ill. Best possible medical attendance. Do not worry.”  

 Mrs. Fielding read it and walked to the rostrum. “President and ladies,”  her paper began, “my child is an example of the benefits of scientific motherhood,” but she did not read it so. As she stood facing her audience, her paper trembled in her hand, and as she looked at the lines written upon it they said but one thing—“Patient seriously ill.”  

 “President and ladies,” she began, “my child is—my child is—”  The lines 

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