He beckoned Katie to a corner.
"That girl's got to go to a hospital," he said; "and if I was you, I wouldn't lose much time in getting her there."
Katie the competent lost none. After another drink to stifle possible protest, Violet was taken upon a car to Sixteenth Street, and was then walked quickly westward. During all the way she did not speak, and, when she reached the hospital's fortunately empty receiving-ward, she was nearly unconscious.
A white-capped nurse received the little party, the young doctor, in shirt-sleeves and duck trousers, hovering in the background among the glass shelves agleam with instruments of polished steel.
"What's the trouble?" asked the nurse.
"It's that that we've come to find out of you," answered Katie.
The nurse nodded to the doctor.
He came forward and made a quick examination.
"Bring this woman inside and put her on the table," he ordered. "And you girls, stop where you are."
Her head thrown back, her dry mouth wide, and her russet hair falling, the unresisting Violet was carried behind a door that shut smartly after her.