“I will.”  Eunice faced her excited aunt quietly.  The odd resemblance to her mother, which only came out in moments of great tension, was plainly visible.  “He shan’t go to the hospital—­they never get proper attention there.  You needn’t try to stop me.  It won’t put you or your family in any danger.”

Caroline fell helplessly into a chair.  She felt that it would be of no use to argue with a woman so determined.  She wished Charles was there.  But Charles had already gone, post-haste, for the doctor.

With a firm step, Eunice went across the field foot-path she had not trodden for so long.  She felt no fear—­rather a sort of elation.  Christopher needed her once more; the interloper who had come between them was not there.  As she walked through the frosty twilight she thought of the promise made to Naomi Holland, years ago.

Christopher saw her coming and waved her back.

“Don’t come any nearer, Eunice.  Didn’t Caroline tell you?  I’m taking smallpox.”

Eunice did not pause.  She went boldly through the yard and up the porch steps.  He retreated before her and held the door.

“Eunice, you’re crazy, girl!  Go home, before it’s too late.”

Eunice pushed open the door resolutely and went in.

“It’s too late now.  I’m here, and I mean to stay and nurse you, if it’s the smallpox you’ve got.  Maybe it’s not.  Just now, when a person has a finger-ache, he thinks it’s smallpox.  Anyhow, whatever it is, you ought to be in bed and looked after.  You’ll catch cold.  Let me get a light and have a look at you.”

Christopher had sunk into a chair.  His natural selfishness reasserted itself, and he made no further effort to dissuade Eunice.  She got a lamp and set it on the table by him, while she scrutinized his face closely.

“You look feverish.  What do you feel like?  When did you take sick?”

“Yesterday afternoon.  I have chills and hot spells and pains in my back.  Eunice, do you think it’s really smallpox?  And will I die?”

He caught her hands, and looked imploringly up at her, as a child might have done.  Eunice felt a wave of love and tenderness sweep warmly over her starved heart.

“Don’t worry.  Lots of people recover from smallpox if they’re properly nursed, and you’ll be that, for I’ll see to it.  Charles has gone for the doctor, and we’ll know when he comes.  You must go straight to bed.”

She took off her hat and shawl, and hung them up.  She felt as much at home as if she had never been away.  She had got back to her kingdom, and there was none to dispute it with her.  When Dr. Spencer and old Giles Blewett, who had had smallpox in his youth, came, two hours later, they found Eunice in serene charge. the house was in order and reeking of disinfectants.  Victoria’s fine furniture and fixings were being bundled out of the parlor.  There was no bedroom downstairs, and, if Christopher was going to be ill, he must be installed there.