"Are you really going to leave him?" asked Pat, wide-eyed.
"I was. Now"—she jerked her hand upward—"how can I? What kind of a brute would I look?"
"Perhaps he will die. Poor Jimmie!"
"If you say 'Poor Jimmie' once again I'll scream at the top of my voice."
A man in chauffeur's livery came down the stairs. He looked beseechingly at Dee. "I couldn't help it, Mrs. James," he gulped. "I never seen him until he grabbed the kid an' then I couldn't turn."
"What kid?" asked Pat.
"Didn't you hear how it happened?"
"No. Tell us."
"I was comin' down the road by the turn above the bridge when a little girl run out from the curb. Mr. James must have been right behind her. I honked and the kid stopped dead. I give the wheel a twist and the kid jumped right under the fender. I knew there wasn't no chance, but I jerked her again and felt her hit somethin' hard, and the kid yelled once, and there was Mr. James under the wheels. He'd seen the little girl and he made a dive for her and shoved her out from under just as I—I got him. It was the nerviest thing"—the man's rough voice broke. "He must-a knowed he didn't have a chance. A—a—man's thinkin' little of himself to do that for a Dago kid he never seen before."
Dee was leaning forward with fixed stare and twitching lips which barely formed the words: "Did Jim do that?"