"Nothing at any time, nothing," he answered, firmly.
It would have been folly to have disbelieved the truthful look of his
wondering face, and she turned away in amazement and confusion. There
was a long pause.
"I hope, Mrs. Miller, you will not refuse any assistance I can render
to your child," he said, at length.
She started, and replied, tremblingly and confusedly, "No, sir; we
shall be grateful to you, if you can save her"; and went quickly, with
a strange abstraction on her white face, into the inner room. He
followed her at once, and, hardly glancing at Mrs. Flanagan, who sat
there in stupefaction, with her apron over her head and face, he laid
his hat on a table, went to the bedside of the little girl, and felt
her head and pulse. He soon satisfied himself that the little sufferer
was in no danger, under proper remedies, and now dashed down a
prescription on a leaf from his pocket-book. Mrs. Flanagan, who had come
out from the retirement of her apron, to stare stupidly at him during the
examination, suddenly bobbed up on her legs, with enlightened alacrity,
when he asked if there was any one that could go out to the apothecary's,
and said, "Sure I wull!" He had a little trouble to make her understand
that the prescription, which she took by the corner, holding it away
from her, as if it were going to explode presently, and staring at it
upside down, was to be left--"_left_, mind you, Mrs.
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