"How awful! And were you there to see it all?" Sally asked with a shiver.
"I had not left the forge very long. I had been talking to Allison, and he told me the mare was a skittish one to manage; and, as I returned, I found a group of men gathered around him, not one of whom had even had the sense of thinking of fetching the doctor. So I first helped them to get poor Allison to his room, and then I rushed to the inn, got a trap, and went and brought a doctor back with me. There is absolutely nothing to be done; but it is a satisfaction to feel that a doctor has seen him. Taken right way, he's not half a bad sort, Sally. He's bearing his pain like a man, and shook me by the hand to bid me good-bye, and even sent a message to you. 'Say good-bye to missy. I'd like to have said it myself,'" he said.
"He shall! I'll go and see him," Sally said, with a set white face. "If the sight of me can give him the smallest pleasure, I'll go."
"It's rather awful, Sally; you've not had to face death yet. I would not go if I were you."
"We all must face it some time or other. I'll go, Paul; I shan't be long. No! don't come with me, please; I'd rather go alone."
"Put on a waterproof, then, and take an umbrella; it's a wild night, and it has just come on to rain," said Paul, and, moved by an unwonted impulse, he stooped and kissed her.
The door of the blacksmith's house was open when Sally reached it, and, entering softly, she removed her wet cloak and stood in the dimly lighted parlour wondering how she should make her presence known. From overhead came the sound of voices talking in suppressed whispers, and once Sally shivered, for a long-drawn moan fell upon her ear.
"I'll go and see the old mother. Perhaps I can stay with her, and set Mrs. Allison free when I have just said good-bye to her husband," thought Sally, as she went up the stairs.
A near neighbour met her at the top.
"We're just at our wits' end, miss," she said in answer to Sally's inquiry. "The old lady's not to be told anything about it, and Mrs. Allison, poor soul! falls out of one faint into another, and can't stay in the room along with him who's dying."