Sanu Maya is alone at home with her little sister. Their father is far away looking for work; he promised to bring back something nice and warm for the girls to wear. Their mother is  busy preparing the field for winter. There's milk and two pieces of bread from yesterday for lunch.

Although Sanu Maya is only six years old, she's good with the fire in the kitchen and warms up the milk in a pot on an iron tripod. Sanu Maya is busy with the cooking pot and doesn't know how it happened, but suddenly the baby is standing with both feet in the fire!

Sanu Maya is paralyzed with shock on seeing her younger sister screaming in the fire. It's only when little Kanchi falls and starts whimpering that Sanu Maya comes back to life and pulls the baby away from the fire.  Then she runs out of the hut to call for help. She screams as loud as she can into the terraced hillsides.

The old shaman, who Sanu Maya fears a little, is just coming around the bend; she rushes into the hut to help. The milk boils over and extinguishes the fire. Acrid smoke and a burning smell fill the room.

Kanchi lies whimpering outside the front door. The shaman painted wet cow dung mixed with herbs on the baby's feet and chanted a mantra before leaving. One of Kanchi's feet is a single big blister, almost like the balloon that the trekkers had given the two girls last week. The other foot looks very dark blue but does not seem to hurt so much. Kanchi is shivering in shock despite being out in the warm sun.

At last the girls' mother comes home and Sanu Maya explains what happened weeping bitterly all the time.

“What a disaster! Oh what a disaster! What should we do?” Sanu Maya's mother is very worried and angry with Sanu Maya and tells her off time-and-again. There isn't a single Rupee in the money box; so medical treatment is out of the question.

Sanu Maya has to walk to the health post and speak to the village doctor.  Maybe he has medicine. Glad to have a mission, she runs off. It is not far, only two hills away.  Sanu Maya crosses a stream and runs around the big Pipal tree. The health post is behind the Pipal tree. The village doctor listens to Sanu Maya's story, stuffs a few bandages and drugs in his pocket and heads off back along the path with Sanu Maya.

It gets dark early in winter and the two reach the hut just before the final rays of the sunset disappear. It has become cold and Sanu Maya realizes only now that she had forgotten her shawl. She trembles from the cold and anxiety.

Sanu Maya's mother has taken Kanchi into the kitchen and placed her next to the goats on straw. The child whimpers in her sleep and looks very pale. The doctor hardly hears the words "She has not eaten anything all day" as he examines the burn injury looking worried. "It's bad," he says, "she must be taken to the hospital."

That is unthinkable for the girls' mother, as she has no money to pay for the hospital treatment.  She looks at little Kanchi with tears in her eyes knowing that this accident has changed the child's life forever.  She asks the village doctor to at least bandage Kanchi's feet.

Mother carries Kanchi in a wicker basket. With a sling, which runs across the forehead and securely holds the basket on her back, she can walk very quickly. Sanu Maya walks beside her, carrying a bundle with a few clothes and two cobs of corn, their food for the journey. It takes them nearly four hours to walk to the hospital.

Once there, Kanchi is examined by the foreign doctor. Mother doesn't understand the what the doctor says but hopes that things will get better. "We have to see how the wounds heal and how deep the burns are," says the sister, who translates the doctor's words. "You'll have to stay here for a few weeks."

The treatment is slow but progresses well and Kanchi will walk again. During her stay in the hospital mother learns of the clay stoves that can prevent such accidents and she wishes she had such a stove in her kitchen.