“So I am just the same, except under this thing,” pointing to the hoop, or basket, which was placed over his limb, to keep off the weight of the bed-clothes. “I am not hurt anywhere else, except this bruise;” and he showed a black bruise on his arm, such as almost any schoolboy can show, almost any day.
“That’s nothing,” pronounced Phil.
“The other was, though, I can tell you,” declared Hugh.
“Was it very, very bad? Worse than you had ever fancied?”
“Oh! Yes. I could have screamed myself to death. I did not, though. Did you hear me, did anybody hear me call out?”
“I heard you—just outside the door there—before the doctors came.”
“Ah! But not after, not while uncle was here. He cried so! I could not call out while was he crying so. Where were you when they were doing it?”
“Just outside the door there. I heard you once—only once; and that was not much.”
“But how came you to be there? It was past bedtime. Had you leave to be up so late?”
“I did not ask it; and nobody meddled with me.”