“That’s good.  You’d starve if you hadn’t.  Coombe’s a terrible healthy place and poor Doc.  Simmonds didn’t pay a call a week.  I just felt like some one ought to warn you.  I despise folks who hold back from telling things because they ain’t quite pleasant.  Know the worst, I always say; it’s better in the end.  Of course, as Mark says, your being a Presbyterian will make considerable diff’rence.  Some folks thought Doc.  Simmonds was pretty nigh an infiddle!”

Too overcome by his feelings to answer, Callandar followed her up the narrow stair and into a clean bright room with green-tinted walls and yellow matting on the floor.

Mrs. Sykes waved a deprecatory hand, at once exhibiting and apologising for so much splendour.

“This is the spare-room,” she explained.  “And there,” pointing to the high, old-fashioned bed, “is Ann.”

Callandar crossed the immaculate matting gingerly, taking Ann on faith, as it were, for, from the door, no; Ann was visible, only a very small dent in the big whiteness of the bed.

“Ann!  Here’s the doctor!”

A small black head and a pair of frightened black eyes appeared for a moment as if by conjuration, and instantly vanished.

“Ann!” said Mrs. Sykes more sternly.

There was a squirming somewhere under the bedclothes, but nothing happened.

“Great Scott!” exclaimed the doctor, “you’ve got the child in a feather-bed!”

Mrs. Sykes beamed complacently.

“Yes, I have.  It may seem like taking a lot of trouble for nothing, but you never can tell.  I ain’t one of them that never prepares for anything.  Jest as soon as Ann gets sick I move her right into the spare-room and put her into the best feathers.  Then if she should be took sudden I wouldn’t have anything to regret.  The minister and the doctor can come in here any hour and find things as I could wish....  Ann! what do you mean by wiggling down like that?  Ann—­come up at once!  The doctor wants to see your tongue.”

This time the note of command was effective.  The black head came to the surface, again followed by the frightened eyes and plump little cheeks stained with feverish red.

“Some cool water, if you please,” ordered the doctor in his best professional manner.  Mrs. Sykes opened her lips to ask why, but something caused her to shut them without asking.

When she had left the room, Callandar leaned suddenly over and lifted Ann bodily out of the dent and placed her firmly upon a pillow.  It was a very plump pillow, evidently filled with the “best feathers,” but compared with the bed it was as a rock in an ocean.

“Now,” he said gravely, “you are safe, for the present.  You are on an island; but be very careful not to slide off for if you do I may never be able to look at your tongue.”

The child’s hands grasped the island convulsively.

“Don’t hold on like that,” he warned.  “You might tip.”  He leaned close so that she might see the smile in his eyes, “And if you tipped ...”