Up the travesty of a street there was a log house outside of which an American flag hung limply from a pole, for there was no wind. The sun was warm yet the air was cool and heady. The American flag, well, then that place must be right enough. People seemed to be coming in and out, a group of men in good cloth suits and derby hats stood outside, talking with serious faces, like men of business and property, not roughs. She left her luggage there on the beach—the two old-country valises that held everything she possessed, including her nurse’s uniforms. She clutched to one side a handful of skirt and petticoat to lift them out of the mud, but not so high as to show her ankles—she knew what was right and proper; and mud would dry and could be brushed off with a whisk. She was reassured, as she plodded along, that everything—ulster, hat, gloves, high-buttoned shoes—all were as they should be.

When she reached the place with the flag she hesitated. The men looked at her with interest, they seemed still to be discussing a topic of real importance and now it seemed to her that she herself was, incredibly enough, a possible part of this discussion. Their glances were respectful enough and they held not only interest but conjecture. As Bridie stood, hesitating, uncertain, one of the men—an older man with a settled look about him, and some gray in his mustache—came toward her.

“Are you the nurse, ma’am?” he asked.

Falteringly, “Yes, I’m a—I’m the nurse.”

The man’s face cleared, he seemed almost to beam. Panic-stricken, she thought, But that can’t be him, he doesn’t look like the picture, so old-looking, surely that can’t be him. The man turned to the others, he waved a triumphant hand. “Here she is, boys!” he shouted. “Here’s the nurse.”

The other faces beamed, then. “What difference does it make,” she asked, almost resentfully, “that I’m a nurse?”

The older man laughed at this, a little ruefully. “We’d about given up, and that’s a fact. We tried nearby first, Fairbanks and Nome, if you can call that nearby, but it got so we figured nobody would come, Seattle or anywhere, though we tried. Nobody would come on account it was smallpox.”

“Smallpox!”

“Seven of them down with it now, two new ones at the All Nations, and Ideal at the Lucky Streak, her face’s a sight they say, like a red raspberry patch, and fever.” Now he looked at her as though for the first time, doubtfully. “You look young,” he said, “for a nurse. Doctor’s off up north. But I bet you know what to do for smallpox, first off.”

“Balsam of Peru lotion,” she replied, automatically. “Balsam of Peru lotion. Apply to pustules. For relief.”

“Sure thing!” the man agreed, triumphantly. “That’s the stuff. The girls don’t want no men around—for a change. Not,” hastily, “that we’re scared.”

“Ya-a-ah!” jeered someone in the group.

“Well, maybe you are, but Thor ain’t,” the man retorted. “Thor went and fixed them some tea and tried to help, didn’t you, Thor?”