Miller, glancing up: “Ah! true.”
Mrs. Crashaw, with an old lady’s serious kindness: “My boy, can’t you think of anything to do for us?”
The Elevator Boy yielding to the touch of humanity, and bursting into tears: “No, ma’am, I can’t. And everybody’s blamin’ me, as if I done it. What’s my poor mother goin’ to do?”
Mrs. Crashaw, soothingly: “But you said the runs in the cogs”—
The Elevator Boy: “How can I tell! That’s what they say. They hain’t never been tried.”
Mrs. Curwen, springing to her feet: “There! I knew I should. Oh”—She sinks fainting to the floor.
Mrs. Crashaw, abandoning Miss Lawton to the ministrations of young Mr. Bemis, while she kneels beside Mrs. Curwen and chafes her hand: “Oh, poor thing! I knew she was overwrought by the way she was keeping up. Give her air, Mr. Miller. Open a—Oh, there isn’t any window!”
Miller, dropping on his knees, and fanning Mrs. Curwen: “There! there! Wake up, Mrs. Curwen. I didn’t mean to scold you for joking. I didn’t, indeed. I—I—I don’t know what the deuce I’m up to.” He gathers Mrs. Curwen’s inanimate form in his arms, and fans her face where it lies on his shoulder. “I don’t know what my wife would say if”—
Mrs. Crashaw: “She would say that you were doing your duty.”
Miller, a little consoled: “Oh, do you think so? Well, perhaps.”