nstructions to his men and started for
the ferry. Once on the boat, he began pacing the deck. "Tom hurt!" he
repeated to himself. "Tom hurt? How--when--what could have hurt her?"
He had seen her at the sea-wall, only three days before, rosy-cheeked,
magnificent in health and strength. What had happened? At the St. George
landing he jumped into a hack, hurrying the cabman.

Jennie was watching for him at the garden gate. She said her mother was
in the sitting-room, and Gran'pop was with her. As they walked up the
path she recounted rapidly the events of the past two days.

Tom was on the lounge by the window, under the flowering plants,
when Babcock entered. She was apparently asleep. Across her forehead,
covering the temples, two narrow bandages bound up her wound. At
Babcock's step she opened her eyes, her bruised, discolored face
breaking into a smile. Then, noting his evident anxiety, she threw the
shawl from her shoulders and sat up.

"No, don't look so. It's nothin'; I'll be all right in a day or two.
I've been hurted before, but not so bad as this. I wouldn't have
troubled ye, but Mr. Crane has gone West. It was kind and friendly o' ye
to come; I knew ye would."

Babcock nodded to Pop, and sank into a chair. The shock of her
appearance had completely unnerved him.

"Jennie has told me about it," he said in a tender, sympathetic tone.
"Who was mean enough to serve you in this way, Tom?" He called her Tom
now, as the others did.

"Well, I won't say now. It may have been the horse, but I hardly think
it, for I saw a face. All I remember clear is a-layin' me hand on the
mare's back. When I come to I was flat on the lounge. They had fixed me
up, and Dr. Mason had gone off. Only the thick hood saved me. Carl and
Cully searched the place, but nothin' could be found. Cully says he
heard somebody a-runnin' on the other side of the fence, but ye can't
tell. Nobody keeps their heads in times like that."

"Have you been in bed ever since?" Babcock asked.

"In bed! God rest ye! I was down to the board meetin' two hours after,
wid Mr. Crane, and signed the contract. Jennie and all of 'em wouldn't
have it, and cried and went on, but I braved 'em all. I knew I had to go
if I died for it. Mr. Crane had his buggy, so I didn't have to walk. The
stairs was the worst. Once inside, I was all right. I only had to sign,
an' come out again; it didn't take a minute. Mr. Crane stayed and fixed
the bonds wid the trustees, an' I come