"Where is she?"
"Lie quiet, Thora. You shall hear everything by and by."
"But tell me where is my little Elin, Anna?"
"Promise me not to excite yourself, Thora, and I will tell you all about her."
Thora raised herself on her elbow and said with quick-coming breath, "You don't mean that you have taken her away?"
"There now, you are exciting yourself already, Thora."
"Have you stolen my child away from me?" cried Thora.
"Oh, dear! Oh, dear! What things you are saying, Thora."
Thora thought a moment and then she said, "I am sorry I said that, Anna. It was very, very wrong of me. I know you wouldn't hurt me for worlds. But why don't you tell me where my little girl is? She's in the nursery, isn't she? You took her away from me in the night, and now she's asleep in her cot--isn't that so? Or perhaps Aunt Margret has taken her down to the door? There! Isn't that she?--that child crying in the home-field? Or was it somebody else's baby in the road? Speak, Anna! You are only teasing me, I know. But I'm so weak, so foolish, and my heart is beating like a drum."
Anna continued to rock herself and to moan, "Oh, dear! Oh, dear!"