“Yes, I know.  You mean’ little Ormsby MacKnight Mitchel.  His people live near here, over on Highland Creek.  His father came there from Virginia.  He intended to bore for salt water, meaning to make salt.  But he found more interest in the wild multiflora roses that bloom all around the Lick, and the bones of unknown animals buried fifty feet beneath the surface of the earth—­though the bones were not found just there—­but farther off at another Lick.”

“Then Master Ormsby MacKnight Mitchel is the true son of his father,” smiled Paul Colbert.  “Neither seems commonplace enough to be content with what everyday people find between heaven and earth.”

He said this idly, as we all speak to one another when casting about for mutual interests before really knowing each other.  Thus the talk drifted for a few moments, with a shy word now and then from David.  And presently a chance reference to the epidemic brought a new light into the doctor’s eyes, and a new earnestness into his voice.

“The fathers and mothers of the country are much alarmed for their children,” he said.  “But there is far more need to be alarmed for themselves.  The Cold Plague attacks the strong rather than the weak.  But all the people, young and old, everywhere through the wilderness, are almost frantic with terror.  They fear infection from every newcomer.  There was a panic throughout this vicinity a few days ago, over the landing of a flatboat, and the coming ashore of the unfortunates who were on it.  They were in a most pitiful plight.  I hope never to see a sadder sight than that poverty-stricken little family.  But they were not suffering from any disease more contagious than want; they were only cold, wet, tired, hungry, and disheartened.  The poor mother was sitting on the damp sand near the water’s edge, with her little ones around her, when I found them.  They were merely stopping to rest on their way from another portion of the state, to the wild country on the other side of the river.”

“We saw them, too, poor things,” said Ruth, quickly, with pity in her soft eyes.  “Father Orin and Toby came by to tell us, and David and I went at once to do what we could.  I can’t forget how the mother looked.  She was young, but had such a sad, haggard face, with such a prominent forehead, and such steady gray eyes.  She held a strange looking little child on her lap.  She said that her name was Nancy Lincoln, and she called the baby ‘Abe.’  He couldn’t have been more than two years of age, but he looked up at Father Orin, and from his face to ours, like some troubled little old man.”

“Yes, Father Orin and Toby were first to the rescue, as they always are.  I can’t imagine when those two sleep, and I am sure they never rest when awake.”