The child lay on the bed in her little summer frock, her face very white now after the shock, Nurse had come carrying the youngest child: and little Annabel stood holding her skirt. Winifred, terribly serious and wooden–seeming, was bending over the knee, from which she had taken his blood–soaked handkerchief. Egbert bent forward, too, keeping more sangfroid in his face than in his heart. Winifred went all of a lump of seriousness, so he had to keep some reserve. The child moaned and whimpered.
The knee was still bleeding profusely—it was a deep cut right in the joint.
'You'd better go for the doctor, Egbert,' said Winifred bitterly.
'Oh, no! Oh, no!' cried Joyce in a panic.
'Joyce, my darling, don't cry!' said Winifred, suddenly catching the little girl to her breast in a strange trag
