Publisher's Synopsis
CHAPTER I.DIVERSE WAYS.Three people were together in a very pleasant little parlor, in a land where the sun shines nearly all the time. They were Doctor Mack, whose long, full name was Alexander MacDonald; mamma, who was Mrs. John Smith; and Josephine, who was Mrs. Smith's little girl with a pretty big name of her own.Doctor Mack called Mrs. Smith "Cousin Helen," and was very good to her. Indeed, ever since papa John Smith had had to go away and leave his wife and child to house-keep by themselves the busy doctor-cousin had done many things for them, and mamma was accustomed to go to him for advice about[2] all little business matters. It was because she needed his advice once more that she had summoned him to the cottage now; even though he was busier than ever, since he was making ready to leave San Diego that very day for the long voyage to the Philippine Islands.Evidently the advice that had so promptly been given was not agreeable; for when Josephine looked up from the floor where she was dressing Rudanthy, mamma was crying softly, and Doctor Mack was saying in his gravest take-your-medicine-right-away kind of a voice that there was "nothing else to do.""Oh, my poor darling! She is so young, so innocent. I cannot, I cannot!" wailed the mother."She is the most self-reliant, independent young lady of her age that I ever knew," returned the doctor.Josephine realized that they were talking about her, but didn't see why that should make her mother sad. It must be all the cousin-doctor's fault. She had never liked him since he had come a few weeks before, and scratched[3] her arm and made it sore. "Vaccinated" it, mamma had said, to keep her from being ill sometime. Which had been very puzzling to the little girl, because "sometime" might never come, while the arm-scratching had made her miserable for the present. She now asked, in fresh perplexity: "Am I 'poor, ' mamma?".
