"Overwork and worry! What are you talking about? They don't put people in the hospital for overwork and worry!" Dave spoke with a rising irritation. "Can't you tell me something that's got some sense to it?"
Janet answered casually as though relating an adventure that in no way touched herself. "I can tell you the whole thing if you want to hear it. We were on the street going to Mrs. Lamont's for the washing when suddenly ma jumped and her hands went up and she shook, and I looked where she was looking because I thought there must be a snake or something on the sidewalk. Then, before I knew what was happening, she screamed and fell and her eyes began rolling and she bit with her mouth until her lips were all bloody and her head jerked around and—and—it was awful!" With a sob in which there was left no pretence of indifference, Janet put her hands before her face to shut out the horror of the scene.
The details were as new to Rosie as to Dave. Janet had not even hinted that it was this which had happened to her mother.
Dave McFadden breathed heavily. "Then what?"
Janet took her hands from her face and, with a fresh assumption of indifference, continued: "Oh, a crowd gathered, of course, and after while a policeman came, and then the ambulance. And while we were in the ambulance she—had another. And when we got to the hospital—another. It was awful!" Janet dropped her head on the table and sobbed.
"Well?" demanded Dave gruffly.
Janet stifled her sobs. "They undressed her and put her to bed and gave her something and she went to sleep. Then the doctor took me into another room and wrote down what he said was a history of ma's case and he asked me questions about everything."
Dave McFadden's sombre gaze wandered off unhappily about the room. "What did you tell him?"
Janet's answer came a little slowly: "I told him everything."
Dave looked at her sharply. "Tell me what you told him!"