"Oh, yes!" replied the lady: "Colorado Springs, the little town we are just coming to, is my home."
"Do you like it?" asked Mrs. March, anxiously.
"Like it!" replied the lady: "like is not a strong enough word. I love it. I love these mountains so that, whenever I go away from them, I miss them all the time; and I keep seeing them before me all the while, just as you see the face of a dear friend you are separated from. I should be very ungrateful, if I did not love the place; for it has simply made me over again. I came out here three years ago on a mattress, with my doctor and nurse, and thought it very doubtful if I lived to get here; and I have been perfectly well ever since."
"Did you have asthma?" asked Rob, turning very red as soon as he had asked the question. He was afraid it was improper. "My papa has the asthma."
"Oh, if that is your papa's trouble, he will be sure to be entirely well. Nobody can have asthma in Colorado," replied the lady. "It is the one thing which is always cured here. My own trouble was only a throat trouble."
"I am very glad to hear you speak so confidently about the asthma," said Mrs. March: "my husband has been a great sufferer from it, and it is for that we have come."
"You have done the very wisest thing you could have done," said the lady "you will never be sorry for it. But here we are; good morning."
The train was already stopping in front of a little brown wooden building, and the brakeman called out: "Colorado Springs."
"What a pleasant lady!" said Nelly to her mother.
"Yes," said Mrs. March; "but it was partly because she told us such good news for papa."