"Oh, I hope not!" said Elizabeth. "Tell me how he was hurt."
"Well, Miss Elizabeth, we don't just know--not just exactly. He had knocked off work and left the shops and was coming across the yards--he always comes home that way, you know--but it was dark, and the snow was all over everything, and the ice, and somehow he slipped and caught his foot in a frog, and just then a switch-engine came along and ran over his leg."
"Oh, horrible!" Elizabeth's brows contracted in pain.
"The ambulance took him right away to the Hospital. Ma felt awful bad 'cause they wouldn't let him be fetched home. She didn't want him taken to the hospital."
"But that was the best place for him, Gusta; the very best place in the world."
"That's what Archie says," said Gusta, "but ma doesn't like it; she can't get used to it, and she says--" Gusta hesitated,--"she says we can't afford to keep him there."
"But the railroad will pay for that, won't it?"
"Oh, do you think it will, Miss Elizabeth? It had ought to, hadn't it? He's worked there thirty-seven years."
"Why, surely it will," said Elizabeth. "I wouldn't worry about that a minute if I were you. You must make the best of it. And is there anything I can do for you, Gusta?"
"No, thank you, Miss Elizabeth. I just came around to see you,"--she looked up with a fond smile,--"and to get my clothes. Then I must go. I want to go see father before I go back home. I guess I'll pack my things now, and then Archie'll come for my trunk this afternoon."