Keturah shook her head. "But if I don't get well? Shall I go to hell?"
Theology is not one of the doctor's strong points. Being as a rule much concerned with the treatment of the body, he expresses himself with diffidence regarding the ultimate fate of the soul. But on this occasion he shook his head vigorously, holding the hot thin little hand in a firm comforting clasp. "You must ask a parson about these things, my dear, but I am quite sure that no little girls go——but you are going to get well—cheer up! Eh?"
"Could I ast the young gentleman parson wot plays cricket?" Keturah's voice was hoarse and eager.
"The very man—couldn't do better. I'll send him round as I go home," and the doctor turned to go. He hurried down the narrow stairs, but stopped at the front door to call back into the house, "She's to live in poultices, mind! Live in 'em."
He stopped at the curate's lodgings as he drove home, and went right in, to find the cleric in question resting his slippered feet upon the chimney-piece, while he smoked and read the evening paper.
"There's a kid down with pneumonia in the Waterlow Cottages, and she fancies she's going to hell. She'd like to see you, so I said I'd send you. Her people are Plymouth Rocks, or some such thing. She's a queer little soul—dying, I fear."
"It can't be Keturah?" exclaimed the curate, swinging his feet off the mantelpiece and standing up on his long legs.
"I believe that is the creature's name."
"Oh, you mustn't let Keturah die! She's a genius!"
"She may be a genius," said the doctor grimly, "but her people are the balliest lunatics in creation, and I rather fancy that geniuses are just as likely to die of neglect as other folk——" But the curate had not waited for the rest of the sentence. He seized his hat and ran into the street, his slippers (down at the heel) going flip, flop, on the wet pavement as he ran.