st like
kind-hearted little Betty to have teased poor Nelly out into the woods.
He would carry them home in his boat; he could rub it clean with some
handfuls of hemlock twigs or river grass. Then he saw how strangely they
looked, as he pushed the boat in and pulled it far ashore. What in the
world had happened?

Nelly tried to speak again and again, but her voice could not make
itself heard. "Oh, don't cry any more, Nelly, dear," said Betty,
trembling from head to foot, and very pale. "We went into the old house
up there by the pasture, and found--Nelly said it was your father, and
we thought he was very ill."

"I'll take you both home, then," said Harry Foster, speaking quickly and
with a hard voice. "Get in, both of you,--this is the shortest
way,--then I'll come back by myself."

"Oh, no, no!" sobbed Nelly. "He looked as if he were dying, Harry; he
was lying on the floor. We will go, too; he couldn't hurt us, could he?"
And the three turned back into the woods. Betty's heart almost failed
her. She felt like a soldier going into battle. Oh, could she muster
bravery enough to go into that house again? Yet she loved her father so
much that doing this for another girl's father was a great comfort, in
all her fear.

The young man hurried ahead when they came near the house, and it was
only a few minutes before he reappeared.

"You must go and tell mother to come as quick as she can, and hurry to
find the doctor and tell him; he will know what to do. Father has been
dreadfully hurt somehow. Perhaps Miss Leicester will let Jonathan come
to help us get him home." Harry Foster's face looked old and strange; he
never would seem like a boy any more, Betty thought, with a heart full
of sympathy. She hurried away with Nelly; they could not bring help fast
enough.

* * * * *

After the great excitement was over, Betty felt very tired and unhappy.
That night she could be comforted only by Aunt Barbara's taking her into
her own bed, and being more affectionate and sympathetic than ever
before, even talking late, like a girl, about the Out-of-Door Club
plans. In spite of this attempt to return to every-day thoughts, Betty
waked next morning to much annoyance and trouble. She felt as if the sad
affairs of yesterday related only to the poor Fosters and herself, but
as she went down the street, early, she was stopped and questioned by
eager groups of people who were trying to find out something m