“The wife of the coal man?”
“Sure.”
“What did she take it for?”
“I dunno. Here comes another doctor—look!”
Another young doctor is hurrying up the steps.
While we are still gaping at the opening and closing door, Mrs. Schmick, the little German woman who sang for me, comes out. She has evidently been laboring in the sick room and seems very much excited.
“Is she dead?” ask a half-dozen people as she hurries upstairs for something.
“No-oh,” she answers, puckering up her mouth in her peculiar way. “She is very low, though. I must get some things,” and she hurries away.
The crowd waits, and finally some light on the difficulty begins to break.
“She wouldn’t live with him if he didn’t stop going with her,” my own landlady is saying. “I heard her say it.”