“If you will wait a minute or two the agent will be back,” said Tavia in her very nicest voice.  “He is just putting the mail on the train.”

“Dear me!” and the nurse turned away.  Then she returned.  “Are you his daughter?”

“No, his—­his niece,” quibbled Tavia.  What else could she do just then?  And didn’t Sam say he would adopt her?

“Well, since you are going to be around here we may as well get acquainted—­I shall probably have plenty of calls at the station.  I see you are the whole service outfit.  The telephone, telegraph, and, I suppose, the—­Press Bureau.”

“Oh, yes,” replied Tavia, not grasping the sarcasm of the “Press” remark.  “Uncle Sam has a great deal to attend to.”

The nurse laughed to show her pretty teeth, Tavia thought.  She was pretty, and her immaculate white linen was immensely becoming.

“My name is—­Bell—­Mary Bell,” she said, “and yours is——­”

“Betsy Dixon,” replied Tavia. (Oh, what a tangled web we weave!)

“What a charming name—­Betsy Dixon!  Quite like a—­bullet from Molly Pitcher’s gun,” said the nurse.  Tavia smiled but failed to catch the significance of that remark.  Betsy was a good old name.  Why like a war bullet?

“Here is the station agent,” said Tavia, as Sam limped back.  “Uncle Sam, have you seen the carriage from the sanitarium?”

Tavia could not overlook the joy in that name—­Uncle Sam.  It was so simple, and so mouth-fitting.

“Here it comes,” replied Sam, also noting how nicely Tavia fell into her role.  “But is this the new nurse?  I have an important message for Miss Bennet.  That’s her—­in the carriage.”

“Miss Bennet!  Why, she’s my classmate!  I never expected to find her, out here in the hills,” spoke the stranger.

The carriage drew up to the little platform.  Miss Bennet alighted and Miss Bell hurried out to meet her.

“Oh, you dear thing!”—­this was very extravagant for trained and graduated nurses—­“to think I should meet you here!  Isn’t it just too nice!” It was Miss Bell who said that.

“Why, Mary Bell!” replied Miss Bennet.  “How glad I am to see you!  And what a surprise!  You are the new nurse!  And I never knew it.  I’m just starting out on such an interesting case!  A young girl, the dearest little thing, has escaped from the sanitarium, and I came out with the carriage to hunt her up.  We had word last night that an old farmer—­named Hobbs—­had caught her.  It may not be true, but I am going out there to see.  It’s a lovely ride.  Can you come?”

The girl who escaped!  Tavia remembered Sarah’s story.

“Miss Bennet, I have a message for you,” said Sam, very slowly.  “It came in over the wire a half hour ago.”  And he handed her the yellow slip of paper.

Miss Bennet looked at it.

“Oh, my!” she gasped.  “My mother!” and she dropped upon a nearby bench.  “She—­is—­dying!”