The girls all shook hands with him before they went off to search the other wards for their blue-eyed baby. Miss Laura did not go with the girls; she stayed with Jim, and somehow, before long, he was telling her all about the Asylum boys and how he dreaded to get well and go there to live till he was fourteen. And, unconsciously, as he told it all, his stubby little fingers crept into Miss Laura’s hand that closed over them with a warm pressure very comforting to Jim.
And then—then a wonderful thing happened, for Miss Laura put her head down close to his and whispered, “Jim, you shall never go to the Asylum, I promise you that. If you will try very hard to get well, I’ll find a home for you somewhere, and I’ll take care of you until you can take care of yourself.”
Jim caught his breath and his eyes seemed looking through hers deep into her heart, to see if this incredible thing could be true. What little colour there was in his face faded slowly out of it and his lips quivered as he whispered, “You—you ain’t—jest foolin’? You mean it, honest Injun?”
“Yes, Jim—honest.”
He struggled to a sitting posture. “Cross your heart!” he ordered breathlessly.
She made the sign that children make. “Cross my heart, Jim. You are my boy now,” she said.
With a long, happy breath Jim fell back on his pillow. His eyes began to shine, and a spot of red burned in each thin cheek. “O gee!” he cried exultantly, and again, “O gee! I’ll get well in a hurry now, Miss Laura.” Then eagerly, “Where’ll I live?”
“I don’t know yet. I’ll find a place,” she promised.
He nodded, happily content just then to leave that in her hands.
“An’ I’ll grow big soon,” he crowed, “and I can earn a lot of money when I’m well, carryin’ papers an’—an’ other ways. An’ you’ll let me be a Boy Scout soon’s I’m big enough, an’ a soldier when I get over being lame?”