Luckily the bystander was a man of action rather than words. He gave attention to the stricken one. “Get the doctor, over there,” he commanded sharply, pointing to a white house nearby.
Ike disappeared on the run.
For seconds which seemed hours, Virginia, held by fright, could not move. Her eyes, wide with horror, stared back at the motionless motorcyclist. His flattened figure resembled a bundle of old clothes dropped carelessly in the roadway. Certain that the man was dead, the terrible thought came to the girl that she was responsible for it. She could hear herself saying, “Hurry, Ike.” It made her frantic, she could not sit still and yet she wondered if she had the strength to move. In a moment, she found herself standing. Hardly knowing what she did, she climbed from the car and moved slowly towards the figure lying in the dust. She watched it fearfully, as if it might suddenly leap at her. Now she saw the face. How dreadfully white it was. Surely he was dead. The pity of this great fellow lying helpless in the street moved her strangely. The pathos of his weakness wrung her heart.
The bystander removed his coat intending to make a pillow of it. Guessing his purpose, Virginia hastened to the car and brought back a cushion.
“Thank you, that will be better,” he told her. Taking the cushion, he held it irresolutely as though planning how best to use it.
“May I help?” To Virginia it seemed that the words came of their own accord. She doubted if she had the strength to do anything.
“If you would, please? When I lift his head, will you push the cushion under?”
The girl dropped upon her knees in the dust of the roadway. It brought her face very near to that of the unconscious man. She noticed that he was young, not much older than herself. When the cushion was placed it lifted his head into an awkward position. Readjusting the cushion, Virginia pushed it too far. The motorcyclist’s head slid over and rested against her knee. For an instant she hesitated and then, making a pillow of her lap, she very gently lifted his head into it.
“That’s better. That’s the stuff,” approved the bystander. Noticing her pallor, he added, “If you can do it.”
“I–I–I will be all right,” she hesitatingly reassured him. Yet, at the moment, she was not at all sure of herself. Was she not holding the head of a dead youth in her lap? It had shifted and a rivulet of blood oozed from a small wound in the forehead, formerly hidden. A deathly sickness swept the girl. But even as it seized her came a determination to fight her feelings and conquer them. She would not faint.