“All the way,—it was a long, crooked flight. I struck my spine on every step.”
“Oh, Peace!” said Gypsy, half under her breath.
“I was sick for a little while; then I got better. I thought it was all over. Then one day I found a little curve between my shoulders, and so,—well, it came so slowly I hardly knew it, till at last I was in bed with the pain. We had come here because it was hard times, and aunt had to support me,—and then there were the doctor’s bills.”
“Doesn’t he say you can ever get well? never sit up a little while?”
“Oh, no.”
Gypsy gasped a little, as if she were suffocating.
“And your aunt,—is she kind to you?”
“Oh, yes.”
A certain flitting expression, that the face of Peace caught with the words, Gypsy could not help seeing.
“But I mean, real kind. Does she love you?”