“It is what she needs. Another glass, please.”
“Oh, no! not so much!” she objected.
“Do as the doc’ says!” commanded one of the men.
Blue, absorbed in the talk, had delayed too long—the dust closet was out of the question. So the woman met him sauntering towards his own door, as if he, too, had been on an errand to the public faucet.
When the eavesdropper returned, the physician was saying:—
“She would not have lived more than four hours. She was dying for lack of water. When she wakes give her more if she wants it, and, unless she sleeps quietly, keep up the medicine through the night. I will see her again in the morning. It is a plain case of measles, and I shall report it to the health officials.”
Blue’s admiration of the man who could keep one from dying by simply administering water was sufficient to hold him on the sidewalk an hour and a half awaiting the doctor’s second visit. He spied the runabout when it was still far up the street, and he was at the curb when the car stopped.
“How is your little friend?” the physician asked.
“She isn’t my friend,” the boy answered. “Huh! they wouldn’t let me say hello to her. But,” lowering his voice confidentially, “I should think they were all dead in there. Haven’t heard a sound this morning.”
“They are sleeping late.” Dr. Alford was mounting the stairs.