I was obliged to cut both her boot-lace and her stocking with my penknife, for her ankle was already so swollen that she could scarcely bear to have it touched. I soaked my handkerchief in a little pool of water, and bound up the foot as carefully as I could.
"Don't cry!" I said. "They'll soon be here with help, and you can lie on the carriage-seat and keep your foot up all the way home. Does it hurt you very dreadfully?"
"It does hurt, but it isn't that!" sobbed Ernestine. "You've saved my life, Philippa, and—I've been so horribly nasty to you, ever since you came to school! I meant to shake that handrail to-day, and send you into the brook; it wasn't an accident at all!"
"I don't think you'd do it again," I said. "It's all right about the bull. Don't let us talk of it now. I want to put another bandage on your poor foot."
"But I will talk of it!" she said. "I've been most disgustingly mean. I'll be very different to you afterwards, if you'll be friends with me. Will you?"
"Of course I will," I said heartily; and I put my arms round her neck, and kissed her.
Mr. Thompson soon arrived with a couple of strong farm-men, and between them they carried my poor groaning school-mate back to the farm, where Mrs. Marshall was waiting, full of alarm at the chapter of accidents which had happened. It was a painful journey home for Ernestine, and it was many weeks before her sprained ankle would allow her to walk, or take any part in our school games again. I think I was able to make the dull hours she had perforce to spend on her sofa pass a little more brightly for her, and she was grateful to me beyond words.
"No, don't!" I said, when she tried once to stammer out her thanks. "We've forgotten all that old time. It's no use remembering bygones. We're going to start afresh now, and we'll all give you ever such a jolly welcome when you're well enough to come into school again."
And so my last trouble at The Hollies had passed away, for Miss Percy's hard discipline had resolved itself into the genial sway of Miss Hope, and Ernestine Salt, who had been the one stormy element in my class, now wrote herself upon the list of my friends.