'Come, Josh,' she called ter me, 'jest you
carry this hyere child inter the house an' lay her on the bed. I
reckon she can have the leetle room, an' you can sleep in the kitchen
ternight.'--'I'm agreeable,' answers I; so I picked her up (she war as
limp an' docile as could be), an' carried her in, an' put her down on
the bed. That was three weeks come Sunday, an' thar she's been ever
since."
Our host had finished his story, yet how much remained untold! All the
care and kindness which the stranger had received at the hands of these
good simple people was passed over in silence, as if not worth
mentioning.
Josh rose and went to the fire to relight his brier-wood pipe, which
had gone out during the recital.
"And is the little girl still very ill?" asked Father Friday, with
gentle concern.
"Yes; an' the trouble is, she gets wus an' wus," was the reply. "The
complaint's taken a new turn lately. She's been in a ragin' fever an'
kind of flighty most of the time. Yer see, she'd had a sight of
trouble afore she broke down, an' that's what's drivin' her distracted.
She'd lost her folks somewhar way down South,--got separated from them
in the hurly-burly of a flight from a captured town; an', childlike,
she set about travellin' afoot all over the land to find them.
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