The Dark Hour

Dr. Kennedy had been to Buffalo, and taken the smallpox, so his
attending physician said, and the news spread rapidly, frightening
nervous people as they never were frightened before.

Nellie had been home for a week or two, but at the first alarm she fled, rushing
headlong through the hall and down the stairs, unmindful of the
tremulous voice, which cried imploringly, "Don't leave me, daughter,
to die alone!"

Hannah followed next, holding the camphor bottle to her nose, and
saying to John when he expostulated with her, "I reckon I's not
gwine to spile what little beauty I've got with that fetched
complaint."

"But, mother," persisted John, "may be it's nothin' but vary-o-lord
after all, and that don't mark folks, you know."

"You needn't talk to me about your very-o-lord," returned Hannah. "I
know it's the very-o-devil himself, and I won't have them pock-ed
marks on me for all the niggers in Virginny."

"Then go," said John, "hold tight to the camphire, and run for your
life, or it may cotch you before you git out of the house."

Hannah needed no second bidding to run, and half an hour later she
was domesticated with a colored family who lived not far from the
Hill. Thus left to themselves, Louis and John, together with the
physician, did what they could for the sick man, who at last
proposed sending for Maude, feeling intuitively that she would not
desert him as his own child had done. Silent, desolate, and forsaken
the old house looked as Maude approached it, and she involuntarily
held her breath as she stepped into the hall, whose close air seemed
laden with infection.