CHAPTER VIII.
WHAT NORAH SAW.
“BOTHER!” said Norah, with vexation.
She sat up in bed in the dark. From the skylight over her door a very faint light filtered in from the shaded lamp in the alley-way; but the cabin was very gloomy.
“Toothache is bad enough in the day,” murmured Norah, indignantly. “But when it wakes one up at night——!” She put her hand to her face, trying to still the throbbing of the offending tooth; obtaining no relief, as was natural, seeing that for half an hour she had been trying such simple means, aided by the warmth of her pillow. The tooth had refused to be soothed; it was evident that sterner measures were demanded.
“Now, if I could remember where I put that bottle of toothache stuff——!” she pondered. “Brownie packed it, I know, and I’m sure I unpacked it; but where did I put it? And I can’t switch on my light to look. Bother the old Germans!”
She slipped out of bed. The breeze blew in sharply through the open port-hole, and shivering a little, she groped for her dressing-gown and slippers, and, having donned them, drew the curtain across the port-hole. Then she found her little electric torch, and blinked as its ray illuminated the cabin.
“That’s better,” she reflected. “Now for that horrid little bottle.”
It is not very easy to hunt for a small object in drawers and boxes when one hand is occupied in pressing the button of an electric torch; and the search was somewhat prolonged. Finally, the missing toothache cure turned up in the retirement of a work-bag, and Norah thankfully applied it to the troublesome tooth. By this time she was cold and tired—glad to get back to the warm comfort of bed.
Peace, however, did not last long. In a very few minutes a heavy step sounded in the alley-way, and an authoritative tap at her half-open door.