“Oh, mother, mother!” she cried, as though addressing someone she knew must be present, “help me to take your place with Julie and Gerald. Tell them to forgive me.”
Meg feared that Jane’s long day of anguish had temporarily unbalanced her mind, but Julie, hearing that cry, reached out a comforting hand.
“Jane,” she said weakly, “don’t feel so badly. I guess we were awfully trying, me and Gerald.”
Passionately Jane caught the child in her arms and held her close. She kissed her forehead and her tumbled hair. Then she reached out a hand to the boy, who had drawn near amazed to see his usually cold, hard sister so affected.
“Give me another chance, Gerald!” she cried, tears streaming unheeded down her cheeks. “Don’t hate me yet. I’m going to begin all over. I’m going to try to be like mother.”
A cry of pain from the small girl then caught her attention.
“Julie, what is it, dear? Are you hurt? What has happened?”
Gerald spoke up: “That’s why we came in here. We were headin’ down the mountain for the Packard ranch when Julie fell. I guess her ankle is hurt.”
Meg at once was on her knees unbuttoning the high shoe. The ankle was swollen, but there were no bones broken.
“It is a bad sprain,” she said.