“They don’t know yet—but they say they don’t think so. I—I’d come right up here, if I were you, Miss Nelson.”
“I’ll be up as soon as I can get there!” she cried, and started to ring off; but his voice arrested her.
“I ordered a taxi sent down for you—it’ll be there any time now.”
She put down the receiver and dashed back to her room, where she hurled herself into her clothes, her brain a confusion of terrors which gave way to compelled calm as she finished dressing and put on her hat. She mustn’t lose her head. She mustn’t lose her head—no matter what had happened. She mustn’t wake Madame Durant—when she saw the doctors, she would know what to tell her, how best to soften the shock. She must notify Greg, and she did not know his address. Learning it took going through several of Félicie’s letters. Getting a sleepy Western Union took more breathless moments. She finally sent the message: “Félicie injured in accident, is at River Hill Hospital. Come at once. Joy Nelson.” She glanced at her watch. It was three o’clock. Three o clock in the morning, and a taxi was waiting outside!
The taxi-driver was an old Irishman with sideburns and a mouth which had not gone shut since he had encountered the accident. She sat in front with him and heard his story on the way. He had been going down the long stretch of road in Wayland when he had encountered the wreck—car in the ditch, young man with bloody face and one arm hanging loose, trying to pull the young lady from beneath scatterings of glass that had been the wind shield. The young man was so distraught-like he wouldn’t even have heard a car go by, but he had pulled up and offered help. Together they had taken away the glass embracing Félicie and carried her to the taxi.
“Glass!” cried Joy. “Did it—is her face——”
“I dunno, Miss. Couldn’t see much of it for blood.” And he resumed his narration. The nearest hospital he knew was the River Hill, and they had driven there. It was private, and it was not their custom to take accident cases, but in the face of this piteous spectacle they could not refuse admittance.
River Hill was on the outskirts of Brighton, and they had scaled the hill almost before he finished the story. She paid him, with no time to reflect that he had been paid in advance, no room for anything but the horror of supposition, as she was admitted.
Hal Jennings was in the ante room off from the hall—his arm in a sling and a bandage over one side of his face.
“Félicie!” Joy cried, without preface. “Was she cut? Did anything happen to her face?”