It seemed
all incomprehensible, unfathomable, too dark for any ordinary words, or
any ordinary consolation to reach.

For the first time in her life she forgot her grandchildren, and the
invariable good luck of the family, and thought mostly about herself.
Toward morning she fell into a troubled doze, but she had scarcely
seemed to drop asleep before a great bell sounded, which summoned her
to rise. It was just six o'clock, and, at this time of the year, pitch
dark. The long ward was now bitterly cold, and Grannie shivered as she
got into her ugly workhouse dress. The other old women rose from their
hard beds with many "ughs" and groans, and undercurrents of grumbling.
Grannie was much too proud to complain. They were all dressed by
five-and-twenty past six, and then they went downstairs in melancholy
procession, and entered the dining-hall, where their breakfast,
consisting of tea, bread and margarine, was served to them. When
breakfast was over they went upstairs to the ground floor, and Grannie
found herself again in the ward into which she had been introduced the
night before.

The women who could work got out their needlework, and began to perform
their allotted tasks in a very perfunctory manner. Grannie's fingers
quite longed and ached for something to do. She was sent for presently
to see the doctor, who examined her hand, said it would never be of any
use again, ordered a simple liniment, and dismissed her. As Grannie
was returning from this visit, she met the labor matron in one of the
corridors.

"I wish you would give me something to do," she said suddenly.

"Well, what can you do?" asked the matron. "Has the doctor seen your
hand?"

"Yes."

"And what does he say to it?"

"He says it will never be any better."

"Never be any better!" The labor matron fixed Grannie with two rather
indignant eyes. "And what are you wasting my time for, asking for
work, when you know you can't do it?"

"Oh, yes; I think I can, ma'am--that is, with the left hand. I cannot
do needlework, perhaps, but I could dust and tidy, and even polish a
bit. I have always been very industrious, ma'am, and it goes sore agen
the grain to do nothin'."

"Industrious indeed!" muttered the matron. "If you had been
industrious and careful, you wouldn't have found your way here. No,
there is no work for you, as far as I can see. Some of the able-bodied
women do out the old women's ward; it would never do to trust it to