Free Substitute Guest by Grace Livingston Hill Page A

Christmas Eve! What can be the matter?”
    “Oh, Ruth! Everything is so mixed up!” cried Daryl softly, trying to brush the tears away and hold her head up bravely. But her lips were quivering, and her eyes were full of trouble.
    Ruth unfastened her snowy coat and dropped it on the floor behind her, putting out her arms to Daryl and folding her in a loving hug.
    “What is it, dear? Tell me, please,” she said softly.
    Daryl yielded for an instant, and then, her face coming in contact with the snowy particles on Ruth’s hair, she lifted her head.
    “Oh, my dear! I’m letting you stand here in all your wet things! But you don’t know how glad I am you have come! I was worried about you, too. I telephoned the garage, and when they said you were on your way in all this awfulness I just trembled. It seemed to me there were just too many things to worry about all at once. I’m glad you are here safe and sound. Here, let me take your hat, and sit down till I pull off your galoshes. I thought if Lance should get back and find you lost that would be the last straw. Thank God you are here safely!”
    “Lance?” said Ruth with sudden fright in her voice. “Where is he? He didn’t start out after he promised me he wouldn’t, did he?
Where
is he?”
    “He didn’t start after you,” said Lance’s sister with a catch of her breath like a sob, “but he’s out, he and a strange man. They’ve gone on foot to take some medicine up the mountain the Farley house on the cliff, where there is a woman who will die if she doesn’t get it by six o’clock. They’ve been gone half an hour, and it’s the longest half hour I ever lived through!”
    “But why did he go on foot, Daryl?” asked the distressed Ruth. “Oh, if Lance hadn’t left the car down in the village for me he would have had it here to use! But he knew I would be here in a short time. Why didn’t he wait and take it?”
    “No, Ruth, it wouldn’t have done any good. They had to go on foot. The river road to the cliff is impassable, a twelve-foot drift. No car could get through. They had to take to the trail.”
    “But if the car had been here they could at least have driven to the foot of the trail. Why didn’t they wait?”
    “They couldn’t wait, Ruth. The woman is dying and every minute counted. And besides, Lance said the car wouldn’t do any good. The snow was too deep, unless it was broken by the plow, or shovels. You mustn’t blame yourself, Ruth. You did just what Lance asked you to do, and besides it had to stay in the garage till it was finished. It couldn’t be used till it was fixed. Now lean back and rest, do, and I’ll get you a cup of something hot. Would you rather have tea or coffee? You look tired to death! I know you have had a terribly hard day. If I had had anyway of getting down there I would have come to help you. But forget it now, and just rest.”
    “Oh, I don’t want anything to eat, Daryl, really I don’t. Please tell me more about this. Who is the woman Lance has gone to help, and what is the matter with her? Did he know he had to go when he talked to me on the telephone?”
    “No, he didn’t. It was just after he hung up that the man came along.”
    “Man, what man?”
    “A stranger! His car stalled right in front of the house. He stripped the gears or something. I didn’t pay any attention to what they said about it, and he was on his way to take some medicine to the Farley house, said he’d staked his life on getting there by six o’clock and he had to take it even if he had to walk. He wanted to get his car fixed, or hire a car, and when Lance told him he couldn’t get there in a car tonight in this storm, he just shut his lips and said he had to go anyway, even if he died in the attempt. Of course when Lance heard it was to save a life he said, ‘Oh, that’s different. Then I’ll go with you.’ So Father got them some ropes and lanterns and things, and Mother made coffee, and got flannel things for