“I don’t want to make you anxious, Miss Jenkins, but I must go back.  The people are my friends.  I’ve been charged with a message for them and I must deliver it.  My poor life would be small forfeit, could I but make them fully understand.”

I said no more for I thought if Jane was set on dying that way she’d just as well get all the pleasure out of it possible.  To my surprise, unmolested and unafraid, she made her way through streets where no one officer went alone.  Haunts of criminals and gamblers, murderers in hiding followed by their unspeakable womenkind.

This dream of Miss Gray’s scorned to limit itself to a hospital for diseased bodies of the wretched inhabitants, but included a chapel for sick souls.  These days it was difficult enough to get money for real things, the unreal stood no chance.  Without resources of her own, backed by no organization, it seemed to me, like a child planning a palace.  To the little missionary the dawn of each glorious day brought new enthusiasm, fresh confidence and the vision was an ever beckoning fire, which might consume her body if it would accomplish her desire.

At present she rented a tiny house in the Quarters and called it her preaching place.  I was told that to it flocked the outcasts of life who listened in silent curiosity to the strange foreign woman delivering a message from a stranger foreign God.

As the days went by the members of my household were deeply absorbed in dreams of a hospital, pursuit of passage money to America, and wisdom in guiding girls.

In all the years in my adopted country I’d never seen so lovely an autumn.  Colors were brighter, the haze bluer, and far more tender the smile of the heavens on the face of the waters.

The song of the North wind through the top of the ancient pines was no melancholy dirge of the dying summer, but a hymn of peace and restful joy to the coming winter.

One lovely day melted into another.  The year was sinking softly to its close when one evening found Zura, Jane and me quietly at work in the living-room of the House of the Misty Star.  Jane was knitting on the eternal bibs, Zura adding figures in a little book.

Our quiet was broken by a knock at the door.  Maple Leaf appeared bearing on a tray a pink folded paper.

“It’s a cable; I know its color,” exclaimed Zura, “and it’s for Miss Jane Gray.”

With shaking fingers Jane tore open the message.  She read, then dropped her face in her hands.

“What is it?” I asked anxiously.

“It’s the hospital.”

“In a cable?” cried Zura.  “Think of that and break into tears.”

“No, the money for it.”

“Money!  Where did you get it?” I demanded, thinking that Jane had suddenly gone crazy.

“I prayed and wrote letters,” she answered.  “Read.”

Still doubting I took the paper and read aloud: 

Build hospital.  Draft for four thousand dollars on way.