“Tom, you’re hurt!”
Her arms went around him, and leaning heavily on her, he hobbled across the room. The pain made him moan, and he sank back in the chair and closed his eyes. The girl knelt on the floor beside him, and began gently to unstrap one of his puttees. After a moment he seemed to recover a little. He sat up and wiped the sweat of weakness from his forehead with his coat sleeve.
“I know I shouldn’t have stopped, Beth, but I—I knew you were alone tonight.” For an instant the drawn lines of pain left his face; his eyes looked into the girl’s tenderly.
Beth looked up into his face, brushing back a wisp of hair that had fallen forward over her eyes. That he had come here frightened her. But she was glad that he had come, and the sight of his pale face with the look of pain on it made her eyes fill with tears of love and sympathy.
“What happened, Tom?” she asked.
The boy shook himself together. “I wouldn’t have stopped, honest, Beth—only my horse threw me—a mile back toward Rocky Gulch.” He winced as the girl withdrew the puttee and began unlacing his shoe.
“Only sprained, I guess,” he added. “But it hurts like the devil—and I’m bruised all over from the fall.” He laughed a little in boyish apology for showing his pain to a girl.
“It was about an hour ago. I wasn’t going to stop—I wanted to get to Vailstown tonight. The horse shied at something, and bolted, and left me lying there. I don’t know—I guess I’m a rotten rider.” He grinned sheepishly.
He had come to her! Of course, it was all he could do then, without a horse and with a sprained ankle at night on the Vailstown road. At the thought of having him here with her when he was hurt and needed her help, the girl’s heart grew very loving and tender.
“I’ve been an hour coming,” he went on quietly—he brushed her hair lightly with his fingers and smiled—“and now I’m here, Beth, I’m—I’m sort of glad the accident happened.”