"Mel—lina! Mel—lina!" called a hoarse voice from above.
"Coming, Gran!" Melina answered, as she shut the back door. She took the custard in its glass dish out of the basket, and carried it, with a spoon, upstairs. "Look what Mrs. Jones has brought you," she said, as she entered her grandmother's room; "she made it on purpose for you, because you're bad."
"Mrs. Jones? Humph! How did she know I was bad?"
"She heard you coughing in the night," Melina replied, refraining from mentioning her conversation with William, who had doubtless carried the news of her grandmother's illness to his mother, lest she should be accused of gossiping. "Will you have the custard now?" she inquired.
Mrs. Berryman assented. She sat up in bed and commenced to eat it; but she appeared to have very little appetite, and, after swallowing a few spoonfuls of the dainty, she told her granddaughter to take the remainder away.
"I'll finish it to-morrow," she said; "it's very nice, made with eggs I taste, but somehow I can't relish it." Then, with a suspicious glance at Melina, she demanded: "Where are my keys?"
"Here," the little girl answered, putting her hand in her pocket and producing them.
"Give them to me."
Melina did so. The old woman placed the keys under her pillow, and lay back in bed with a deep-drawn sigh.
"If I'm not better to-morrow I'll have a doctor," she remarked, adding: "Mind, child, you're not to leave the house."