"Laurie ... attend ..." she began again. Then she broke off.
"Have you prayed, Laurie...? Do you understand what has happened to you? You aren't really ill—at least, not exactly, but—"
Again those eyes lifted, looked, and dropped again.
It was piteous. For the instant the sense of nausea vanished, swallowed up in emotion. Why ... why, he was there all the while—Laurie ... dear Laurie....
With one motion, swift and impetuous, she had thrown herself forward on to her knees, and clasped at the hanging hands.
"Laurie! Laurie!" she cried. "You haven't prayed ... you've been playing, and the machinery has caught you. But it isn't too late! Oh, God! it's not too late. Pray with me! Say the Our Father...."
Again slowly the eyes moved round. He had started ever so little at her rush, and the seizing of his hands; and now she felt those hands moving weakly in her own, as of a sleeping child who tries to detach himself from his mother's arms.
"I ... I ... I'm all—"
She grasped his hands more fiercely, staring straight up into those strange piteous eyes that revealed so little, except formless commotion and uneasiness.
"Say the Our Father with me. 'Our Father—'"