"Did you do exactly what is written here?" I asked.
"I took it all at once. There wasn't much of it, and I was feeling bad."
"But then of course it nearly killed you. I wonder it didn't quite. What good is it our taking all the trouble we do to send that long distance for the doctor if you don't do as he orders?"
"I'll take no more of his medicine. If it had been any good and able to cure me, the more I took the quicker I ought to have been cured." And she scrubbed and thumped with astounding energy, while Lotte lay with her little ashen face a shade more set and suffering. The wash-tub, though in the middle of the room, was quite close to Lotte's bed, because the middle of the room was quite close to every other part of it, and each extra hard maternal thump must have hit the child's head like a blow from a hammer. She was, you see, only thirteen, and her skin had not had time to turn into leather.
"Has this child eaten anything to-day?"
"She won't."
"Is she not thirsty?"
"She won't drink coffee or milk."
"I'll send her something she may like, and I shall send, too, for the doctor."
"I'll not give her his stuff."