How about the grocer’s bills? Are they all paid?”

The man shivered as if a cold blast had struck him, and he groaned.

“Yes, I thought so!” said the doctor. “Nothing like a lot of unpaid bills to put a person down sick in bed and ready for the undertaker. Let’s get them off your chest.”

“Are these all your bills, Mr. Shambley?” asked Paige, holding up a bunch of papers he had brought from the drawer in the dining room where he got the mortgage papers.

The sick man looked up with a start and then sank back.

“Yes,” he groaned. “Those are all of them. But if I could get a job I’d soon have those out of the way.”

“Well, it’ll be time enough to talk about that when you get well and have a good job so you can take care of your family. Let’s get these out of the way now. Madison, you add those up, and I’d like to chip in and help with them. I want to see this man get well. Here’s a milk bill. Twenty dollars, and it’s dated two months ago! Is that why Nannie hasn’t been drinking milk anymore? Well, we’ll see about that. I want her to have plenty of milk, and you, too. The whole family needs milk. I’ll just take this bill along and settle it up and see that they send some milk over right away tonight. And you get the other bills together.”

“There aren’t so many of them. Two groceries, and the shoe store; Johnny had to have his shoes fixed or he couldn’t go to school. A small bill at the hardware. The ax broke and we had to have another to cut down a tree for a fire. There’s a gas bill, too, and electric light, but they’ve been cut off for three weeks.”

“There, now, don’t think anything more about it,” said Paige. “These don’t add up to so much. We’ll be able to get enough to cover these, so don’t worry. Now, let’s go over them again and see if we’ve missed anything.”

Paige’s matter-of-fact tone seemed to give a new kind of strength to the discouraged man.

“Now, are you sure there isn’t anything else?”

“The bread man,” murmured the poor man.

“Yes. But that’s not so much. I can get you money enough to cover all these, and a little more to keep you going until you get your job. It won’t pay to starve yourself or your family. It only makes more bills. So now, let’s get this thing straight. You are to eat some more soup and bread and coffee, and then you’re to go to sleep and put all your troubles out of your mind. That’s the first step to righting things. The doctor says your little girl is not going to die at present and will get well soon if you brace up and get well yourself.