But Maggie had started in and meant to see the matter through: "Let
her be mad!"
"Well, it's not my doin'," Sarah said with a fine carelessness, and
crept up-stairs to listen again at Mrs. Richie's door. "Seemed like as
if she was sort of--cryin'!" she told Maggie in an awed whisper
when she came down.
David brought his message to the doctor's belated breakfast table.
William had been up nearly all night with a very sick patient, and
Martha had been careful not to wake him in the morning. He pushed his
plate back, as David repeated Maggie's words, and looked blankly at
the table-cloth.
"She's never really got over the shock about Sam Wright's Sam, has
she?" Martha said. "Sometimes I almost think she was--" Mrs. King's
expressive pantomime of eyebrows and lips meant "in love with him"--
words not to be spoken before a child.
"Nonsense!" said William King curtly. "No; I don't want any more
breakfast, thank you, my dear. I'll go and hitch up."
Martha followed him to the back door. "William, maybe she's lonely.
I'm very tired, but perhaps I'd better go along with you, and cheer
her up?" "Oh, no," he called back over his shoulder; "it isn't
necessary." Then he added hastily, "but it's very kind in you, Martha,
to think of it."
"I'd just as lieves," she insisted flushing with pleasure.
He tried to get his thoughts in order as he and Jinny climbed the
hill. He knew what, sooner or later, he must say to Mrs. Richie, and
he thought with relief, that if she were really ill, he could not say
it that day. But the sight of David had brought his duty home to him.
He had thought about it for days, and tried to see some way of escape;
but every way was blocked by tradition or religion. Once he had said
stumblingly to Dr. Lavendar, that it was wonderful how little harm
came to a child from bad surroundings, and held his breath for the
reply.
"An innocent child in a bad home," said Dr. Lavendar cheerfully,
"always makes me think of a water-lily growing out of the mud."
"Yes!" said the doctor, "the mud doesn't hurt it."
"Not the lily; but unfortunately, Willy, my boy, every child isn't a
lily. I wouldn't want to plant one in the mud to see how it would
grow, would you?"