“Keep quiet, will you?” said Norah, putting her hand on the woman and pushing her back as easily as if she had been a child. “Now come here, Nell, and let me look at you.”
Out of the far corner of the cellar into which Flanagan had thrown her when she heard Norah's voice, and into the small circle of light made by a single tallow candle, there crept slowly the figure of a child literally clothed in rags. Norah reached out her hand to her as she came up—there was a scared look on her pinched face—and drew her close to the light.
“Gracious! your hand's like an ice-ball!” exclaimed Norah.
Pinky looked at the child, and grew faint at heart. She had large hazel eyes, that gleamed with a singular lustre out of the suffering, grimed and wasted little face, so pale and sad and pitiful that the sight of it was enough to draw tears from any but the brutal and hardened.
“Are you sick?” asked Norah.
“No, she's not sick; she's only shamming,” growled Flanagan.
“You shut up!” retorted Norah. “I wasn't speaking to you.” Then she repeated her question:
“Are you sick, Nell?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”