“Something dreadful. All my sisters have it.”
“Goodness!” breathed Dot.
“What is it?” asked Tess, bravely standing her ground.
“It’s quarantine,” declared Mabel Creamer, solemnly. “And I have to sleep in the library, and I can’t go up stairs. Neither does pop. And mamma never comes down stairs at all. And I have to play alone here in the yard,” sighed Mabel. “It’s just awful!”
“I should think it was,” gasped Tess. “Then, that must be a doctor that comes to your house every day?”
“Yes. And he is real mean. He won’t let me see mamma—only she comes to the top of the stairs and I have to stay at the bottom. Quarantine’s a nawful thing to have in the house.
“So you’d better stand farther off from that fence. I was real mean to you girls once, and I’m sorry enough now. But I hadn’t ought to play with you, for maybe I’ll have the quarantine, too, and I’ll give it to you if you come too close.”
“But we can play games together without coming too near,” said Tess, her kind heart desiring to help their neighbor. “We’ll play keep house—and there’ll be a river between us—and we can talk over a telephone—and all that.” And soon the three little girls were playing a satisfying game together and Mabel’s tears were dried and her heart comforted for the time being.
That night at dinner, however, Dot waxed curious. “Is quarantine a very bad disease? Do folks die of it?” she asked.
So the story came out, and the older girls laughed at the young one’s mistake. It was learned that all the Creamer children save Mabel had the measles.