'Oh, it's nothing, I should think,' said she; 'it will be some one who has arrived by the train, and has come to the wrong door.'
Whilst they were talking, the bell rang again, more violently than before, and Betsey Ann opened the door. It was a dark night, but she could see a man standing on the doorstep.
'Is this Mrs. Joyce's?' he inquired.
'Yes,' said the girl; 'she lives here.'
'Then she's wanted,' said the man; 'tell her to be quick and come.'
'What's the matter?' asked Rosalie.
'It's an accident,' said the man. 'He's in the hospital, is her husband; he's been run over by a van. I'll take her there if she'll be quick; I'm a mate of Joyce's, and I was passing at the time.'
Rosalie stood as if she had been stunned, unable to speak or move, whilst
Betsey Ann went upstairs to tell her mistress.
'It's all along of that drink,' said the man, more as if talking to himself than to Rosalie. 'It's an awful thing is drink. He never saw the van nor heard it, but rolled right under the wheels. I was passing by, I was, and I said to myself, "That's Joyce." So I followed him to the infirmary, and came to tell his wife. Dear me! it's a bad job, it is.'
In a few minutes Mrs. Augustus Joyce came downstairs dressed to go out. Rosalie ran up to her and begged to go with her, but she was ordered to go back to bed, and her stepmother hastened out with the man.