Thankful stepped to the sofa whereon lay the convalescent Major Van Zandt.
"Tell me, sweetheart," said the major, taking her hand in his, "when you married me, as you told the chaplain, that you might have the right to nurse me, did you never think that if death spared me I might be so disfigured that even you, dear love, would have turned from me with loathing?"
"That was why I did it, dear," said Thankful mischievously. "I knew that the pride, and the sense of honor, and self-devotion of some people, would have kept them from keeping their promises to a poor girl."
"But, darling," continued the major, raising her hand to his lips, "suppose the case had been reversed: suppose you had taken the disease, that I had recovered without disfigurement, but that this sweet face—"
"I thought of that too," interrupted Thankful. "Well, what would you have done, dear?" said the major, with his old mischievous smile.
"I should have died," said Thankful gravely.
"But how?"
"Somehow. But you are to go to sleep, and not ask impertinent and frivolous questions; for father is coming to-morrow."
"Thankful, dear, do you know what the trees and the birds said to me as I lay there tossing with fever?"
"No, dear."