"But you are not to talk: you have had a fever, from fatigue, you know, and it might come back. Just let me go to the office and I will promise to return for instructions at the very first trouble Ralph meets."
Dorothy was already on her feet. She knew the very worst thing the major could do in his present condition would be to talk business.
"Now I'm off," she said, with a kiss and an assuring smile, "you will be proud of to-morrow's Bugle. 'All about Memorial Day!' 'Get the Bugle if you want the news!'" she added, in true newsboy style. Then Aunt Libby came in to wait on the major.
But Dorothy's heart was not as light as her smile had been. Her father looked very ill, and the bread and butter of the Dale household depended upon the getting out of the Bugle.
Her brothers, Joe and Roger, had been sent to school early to be out of the way, but to-morrow they might both stay home, thought the sister, for they could help sell papers.
"Father never would let the boys do it," she reflected, "but he is sick now, and we must do the very best we can. If he were ill a long time we would have to get along."
Only waiting to snatch up a sandwich left from her brothers' lunch,—for she knew the noon hour would be a busy time at the Bugle office,—Dorothy hurried out and over to Tavia's.
"I can't go to school to-day," she called in at the half opened door.
"Father is sick, and I must attend to some business for him."
"Bad?" queried Tavia, for she noticed the change in her friend's manner.
"Perhaps not so very. But you know he is seldom sick, and now he has a fever."