"I seen the chillern agoin' hum from school," she maintained.
"Them was the Jenkinses, Iry hez come down with the scarlit fever, and they're all in quarrytine."
"How you talk! Wait till I put the kittle offen the bile."
The two neighbors sat down to discuss this affliction with the ready sympathy of the poor for the poor. Their passing envy of the Jenkins's good fortune was instantly skimmed from the surface of their friendliness, which had only lain dormant and wanted but the touch of trouble to make them once more akin.
When the city physician had pronounced Iry's "spell" to be scarlet fever, the other members of the household were immediately summoned by emergency calls. The children came from school, Amarilly from the theatre, and the Boarder from his switch to hold an excited family conference.
"It's a good thing we got the washin's all hum afore Iry was took," declared the optimistic Amarilly.
"Thar's two things here yet," reported Mrs. Jenkins. "Gus come hum too late last night to take the preacher's surplus and Miss King's lace waist. You was so tired I didn't tell you, 'cause I know'd you'd be sot on goin' with them yourself. They're all did up."
"Well, they'll hev to stay right here with us and the fever," said
Amarilly philosophically.
At heart she secretly rejoiced in the retaining of these two garments, for they seemed to keep her in touch with their owners whom she would be unable to see until Iry had recovered.
"I don't see what we are going to do, Amarilly," said her mother despairingly. "Thar'll be nuthin' comin' in and so many extrys."