About an hour later, as he was lying quietly on his back, he was delighted to see his mother coming towards him. The sudden movement he made, hurt him dreadfully but he quickly mastered himself, and gave no indication whatever of the pain he experienced. The nurse had given the mother strict orders not to touch him but, when she saw her Willie there before her, the great love she bore him made her forget everything. She threw her arms about him and before he could say a word, had given him a hug and a hearty kiss. It was almost as bad as the doctor's examination. Willie writhed in pain, but he uttered no complaint.
"O my dear, dear boy," exclaimed Mrs. Daly, seeing his efforts at suppressing the pain. "The nurse told me not to touch you, and here I've almost squeezed the life out of you, and made you suffer in every part of your body."
His suffering was so intense that it was some minutes before Bill could reply to her. At length he said, "O mother, I'm so glad to see you. It seems so long since I left the house yesterday and, mother, life seems so different."
This exhausted him. He just lay still, his mother's hand on his forehead, and her eyes looking into his. In his weakened state, tears soon gathered, not of pain, but of gratefulness, of emotion from a high resolve to bury the old Bill Daly and to live anew.
By degrees they began to talk. She told him of the night before, and the meeting with the boy at the office below, and his kindness to her. Bill was all interest. She could not recall the boy's name and she was a poor hand at description. Bill mentioned a number of his corner chums. The Club boys did not even enter his head. "Think hard, mother, and see if you can't get it. I want to know. I didn't think anyone cared so much for me."
"O yes, now I remember," she replied, "When Father Boone came in he called him Frank."
That was too much for Bill. He thought of a thousand things all at once. His mother, only half understanding, continued: "He was one of the nicest boys I ever saw. When we got to our house, he took me by the hand and says, 'Don't worry, Mrs. Daly. You've got one of the finest boys in the world, and he'll be home with you soon,' and his voice as kind and as tender as a woman's, God bless him!"
Bill was still thinking. This was the boy he had provoked to fight, the one who had had to take the brunt of the director's anger! Mrs. Daly was rambling on when Bill looked up and asked her if Father Boone had been around.
She was not a little surprised. "Didn't you know about him, dear?" she inquired. Then she proceeded to tell everything in detail, from the time that Father Boone brought her the news until he closed the taxi door and sent her home with Frank. The narration seemed to Bill like a story from a book. He had the illusion, again, of not being a party to the events at all, but just a spectator. Then the thought of his ingratitude came back full force. The kindly and tactful deeds of Father Boone bored into his soul like a red hot iron. What an ingrate he was. Hero! indeed. Such a hero!
While he was thus reflecting, the nurse came over and informed his mother that it was time to go now, as the doctors would be in soon. Reluctantly she bade good-bye to her boy. Wiser by experience, she did not embrace him, but just bent low and kissed him gently on the forehead.