THE SPREAD OF FIRE The doctor kept his word.

His hand was the first that touched Jane's when she came down the gangplank, Martha beside him, holding out her arms for the child, cuddling it to her bosom, wrapping her shawl about it as if to protect it from the gaze of the inquisitive.
"O doctor! it was so good of you!" were Jane's first words.

It hurt her to call him thus, but she wanted to establish the new relation clearly.
She had shouldered her cross and must bear its weight alone and in her own way.

"You don't know what it is to see a face from home! I am so glad to get here.

But you should not have left your people; I wrote Martha and told her so.