“Take your time,” said Kent good-naturedly.
She was silent for a few steps. Then, nerving herself, she went on with more coherence.
“He was just in front of me when I came out, and as he saw me he ran away, frightened—like a little scared animal; you know his ways. And crossing the road, not looking where he was going, he turned his head round as if to see I was not following him, and then he slipped—oh-h! under the hoofs of a horse—in a hansom. And the driver tried to pull up sharp, and the horse came down too—on top of Jack!”
“Good God!” said Kent.
“A crowd at once collected. I rushed through—I must have screamed a little and cried that I knew him, for the people made way for me. It all seemed like a horrid dream. I can't tell what happened, except that I found myself kneeling on the ground with the poor little mite's head on my lap. Then someone was talking to me, who said he was a doctor, and began to examine the boy's injuries.”
“Is he badly hurt?”
“The doctor does not know yet. No bones are broken—the injuries are internal.”
“Is he at the hospital?”
“No. At his own home. I gave them the address, and told them his mother would care for him—why, I don't know. And then they got a stretcher from the police-station and carried him home, and I went with them and broke it to his mother. But, oh! Mr. Kent, almost the most awful part of it is that it seems as if I was the cause of it.”
“Nonsense, my dear child,” said Kent in rough earnestness.