Page:What Katy Did.djvu/237

Rh no Aunt Izzie came near her. Blessings brighten as they take their flight. Katy began to appreciate for the first time how much she had learned to rely on her aunt. She missed her dreadfully.

"When is Aunt Izzie going to get well?" she asked her father; "I want her so much."

"We all want her," said Dr. Carr, who looked disturbed and anxious.

"Is she very sick?" asked Katy, struck by the expression of his face.

"Pretty sick, I'm afraid," he replied. "I'm going to get a regular nurse to take care of her."

Aunt Izzie's attack proved to be typhoid fever. The doctors said that the house must be kept quiet, so John, and Dorry, and Phil were sent over to Mrs. Hall's to stay. Elsie and Clover were to have gone too, but they begged so hard, and made so many promises of good behavior, that finally Papa permitted them to remain. The dear little things stole about the house on tiptoe, as quietly as mice, whispering to each other, and waiting on Katy, who would have been lonely enough without them, for everybody else was absorbed in Aunt Izzie.