She was neither young nor old, but as she lay on the floor she was ghastly white, even in the glare from the smoking oil lamp, and her lips were blue. Her cheap hat was wet and weighted down with sleet, and the green dye from the trimmings had run down and streaked her face. She was fairly well clad, but not against the winter rain, and her shoes were too light and too high of heel for tramping a railway track. Peter saw she was wet to the skin. He bent down and with his knee against her shoulder moved her inside the door and closed it.
“That's hot in there,” said the boy, who had been staring into the glowing coals of the opened stove. “I better not put my hand in there. I'll burn my hand if I put it in there, won't I?”
“Yes, indeedy,” said Peter, “but now I got to fix your ma so's she will be more comfortable.”
“I wish I had some liquor or something,” he said, looking at the woman helplessly. “Brandy or whisky would be right handy, and I ain't got a drop. This ain't no case for cold water; she's had too much cold water already. I wonder what coffee would do?”
He put his coffee-pot down among the coals of his fire and while he waited for it to heat, he drew on his shoes.
“I guess your ma will feel sort of sick when she wakes up,” he told the boy, “and I guess she'd be right glad if we took off them wet shoes and stockings of yours and got your feet nice and warm. You want to be ready to help look after your ma. You ain't going to be afraid to let me, are you?”
“No,” said the boy promptly, and held out his arms for Peter to take him. He was a solid little fellow, as Peter found when he picked him up, and his hair was a tangled halo of long, white kinks that burst out when Peter pulled off the red stocking-cap into which they had been compressed. From the first moment the boy snuggled to Peter, settling himself contentedly in Peter's arms as affectionate children do. He had a comical little up-tilt to his nose, and eyes of a deeper blue than Peter's, and his face was white but covered with freckles.
“That's my good foot,” said the boy, as Peter pulled off one stocking.
“Well, it looks like a mighty good one to me, too,” said Peter. “So far as I can see, it is just as good as anybody'd want.”
“Yes. It's my hop-on-foot,” explained the boy. “The other foot is the lame one. It ain't such a good foot. It's Mama's honey-foot.”