“I know you are a preacher.  I suppose it is your business to talk like that.”  Then when Carol and David only smiled excusingly, she said, “Excuse me, I didn’t mean to be rude.  But it is hideous, and—­I love to be happy, and laugh,—­”

“Go on and do it,” urged David.  “We’ve just been waiting to hear you laugh.”

“You should have been at the office with me,” said Carol.  “We laughed until we were nearly helpless.  It is that silly Mr. Gooding again, David.  He isn’t very sick, Miss Tucker,—­he just has red rales.  I don’t know what red rales are, but when the nurses say that, it means you aren’t very sick and will soon be well.  But Gooding is what he calls ‘hipped on himself.’  He is always scared to death.  He admits it.  Well, last night they had lobster salad, a silly thing to have in a sanatorium.  And Gooding ordered two extra helpings.  The waiter didn’t want to give it to him, but Gooding is allowed anything he wants so the waiter gave in.  In the night he had a pain and got scared.  He rang for the nurses, and was sure he was going to die.  They had to sit up with him all night and rub him, and he groaned, and told them what to tell his mother and said he knew all along he could never pull through.  But the nurse gave him some castor oil, and made him take it, and finally he went to sleep.  And every one is having a grand time with him this morning.”

Nancy joined, rather grudgingly, in their laughter.

“Oh, I suppose funny things happen.  I know that.  But what’s the use of laughing when we are all half dead?”

“I’m not.  Not within a mile of it.  You brag about yourself if you like, but count me out.”

“Hello, Preacher!  How are you making it to-day?”

They all turned to the window, greeting warmly the man who stood outside, leaning heavily on two canes.

“Miss Tucker, won’t you meet Mr. Nevius?”

In response to the repeated inquiry, David said, “Just fine this morning.  How are you?”

“Oh, I am more of an acquisition than ever.  I think I have a bug in my heart.”  He turned to Miss Tucker cheerfully.  “I am really the pride of the institution.  I’ve got ’em in the lungs and the throat and the digestive apparatus, and the bones, and the blood, and one doctor includes the brain.  But I flatter myself that I’ve developed them in a brand-new place, and I’m trying to get the rest of the chasers to take up a collection and have me stuffed for a parlor ornament.”

“How does a bug in the heart feel?”

“Oh, just about like love.  I really can’t tell any difference myself.  It may be one, it may be the other.  But whichever it is I think I deserve to be stuffed.  Hey, Barrows!” he called suddenly, balancing himself on one cane and waving a summons with the other.  “Come across!  New lunger is here, young, good-looking.  I saw her first!  Hands off!”

Barrows rushed up as rapidly as circumstances permitted, and looked eagerly inside.