“But they don’t all suffer,” said the nurse the boys called “Brown Eyes.” “Most of them are happy—and it hurts, sometimes, to see how many hate to go home. You see, many of the homes are so poor and comfortless—not even a decent bed. They dread going back, after having been cared for here—they know their mothers haven’t time or money to look after them properly. But there are always more waiting to come in—we have to send them out as soon as possible.”
The Billabong children were very silent as the motor whirred through the busy streets, and back to the hotel. Even Wally was quiet; he stared before him, whistling under his breath, in an absent-minded fashion. And Norah looked at Jim’s long legs, thinking of the crippled limbs that were so ordinary in the hospital day’s work.
But back in the hospital the tongues wagged freely. It would be very long before the Billabong visit was forgotten.
“Weren’t they jolly—just!”
“Didn’t they speak nice!”
“That long feller with the thin face—wasn’t he a hard case?”
“Them little girls wasn’t dressed a bit swell—they was only in print frocks. My best dress ain’t print—it’s Jap. silk!”
“They lef’ us lovely things. An’ the man said they was our very own. I’m goin’ to take my doll home to Myrtle when I go out!”
“They left brightness wherever they went,” said little “Brown Eyes”—who was not usually poetical. “I’m not even tired to-night!”
In the boys’ surgical ward, after the lights were out, there was still talking—it had been a great day, and excitement yet seethed. Little Tommy was silent. He had fallen asleep, one hand thrust beneath his pillow, where the watch had gone to sleep, too. The other hand held his new knife in a tight, hot clasp. There was the shadow of a smile on his thin little face. One might fancy that he had found his way to a Dream Country, where there were no crippled boys any more.