“I'm just frightened, that's all,” answered Allis. “Mr. Mortimer saved me.”
Had he? he wondered. How had he come in there, anyway? His mind refused to work out the problem; his side was so sore.
“Yer arm's broke,” said Mike, passing to Mortimer's right side. “Come, lean on me, sir. Can ye walk? I'll put ye in the buggy and drive ye to the house.”
At the first step Mortimer staggered and swayed like a drunken man. In his side were many sharp things pulling him down like grappling irons; on his head was a great weight that crushed his feet into the hard planks; his knees gave under this load, and he would have fallen but for Mike's strong arm.
“I'm—afraid;” then he set his teeth hard, his voice had sought to end the sentence in a groan of anguish; the thing that was tearing at his side had whistled in his lungs.
Allis stepped forward swiftly, and passing her arm about his waist, helped Mike lead him to the door. Twice she put her left hand up and brushed tears from her eyes; the struggle had unnerved her. Very helplessly against her swayed the man she had laughed at half an hour before. And he had been crushed saving her! But that was not why the tears came—not at all. She was unstrung. “And he's got grit,” she kept muttering to herself; “he has never even groaned.”
Together they succeeded in getting him into the buggy; then, gently, Mike drove to the house.
XI
Mrs. Porter, reading a book on the veranda, heard the crunch of wheels as a buggy, slow-moving, turned into the drive. She raised her eyes leisurely, the matter of the story still in her mind; but with a quick cry of “John!” she sprang to her feet, the volume, left to itself, rustling from her lap to the floor. The mother eyes saw that something was wrong, and the mother heart felt that some evil had come to Allis. Mrs. Porter had gone white in an instant. Over her hung heavy at all times the dread of some terrible accident coming to Allis through the horses.