And so it had come to pass that while for weeks this malignant fever had been creeping about on the river shore, we, in our clearer, purer air, had not felt even a dread of it. There had not been a single case of it west of the high water mark made by the terrible freshet of the previous spring. We sent brandy and wine and beef-tea into the poor, comfortless, grief-stricken houses; and we said at tea-time that it was strange, people would persist in living down under the bank: what could they expect? and besides, they were "so careless about drainage and ventilation."
Now, on the highest and loveliest spot, in the richest and most beautiful house, the sweetest and fairest girl of all our village lay ill of the deadly disease.
"Annie Ware has the fever." I wondered if some fiend were lurking by my side, who kept saying the words over and over in my ear. With that indescribable mixture of dulled and preternaturally sharpened sense which often marks the first moments of such distress, I walked slowly to my room, and in a short time had made all the necessary preparation for leaving home. I felt like a thief as I stole slowly down the stairs, with my travelling-bag in my hand. At the door I met my father.
"Hey-day, my darling, where now? Off to Annie's, as usual?"
He had not heard the tidings! Should I tell him? I might never see him again; only too well I knew the terrible danger into which I was going. But he might forbid me.
"Yes, off to Annie's," I said in a gay tone, and kissing him sprang down the steps.
I did not see my father again for eighteen days.
On the steps of my uncle's house I met old Jane, a colored woman who had nursed Annie Ware when she was a baby, and who lived now in a little cottage near by, from whose door-steps she could see Annie's window, and in whose garden she raised flowers of all sorts, solely for the pleasure of carrying them to Annie every day.
Jane's face was positively gray with sorrow and fear. She looked at me with a strange sort of unsympathizing hardness in her eyes. She had never loved me. I knew what she thought. She was saying to herself: "Why not this one instead of the other?"
"O auntie!" I said, "I would die for Annie; you know I would."