But it was sweet and clean, and Dorothy closed her eyes directly after Samanthy Hobbs put to her lips a drink of catnip tea!

“She’s the girl from the asylum,” whispered the farmer’s wife.  “Jest keep still and we will git her back all right.”

CHAPTER XIII

THE SAD AWAKENING

Such a long, lovely sleep, on that fluffy feather bed!  Everything so sweet, so wholesome, even in her half-conscious state Dorothy knew that things about her were right—­that they were “homey.”

Then the smooth-roughness of that woman’s hands, the life of them seemed to cry out comfort, while the harsh flesh told another story.

Twice Dorothy had opened her eyes over a pan of chicken broth.  She had to take it, and she was glad of it.

Then, outside in the hall room, that was really nothing more nor less than a landing for the unrailed stairs, she thought she could hear the old-fashioned voice of a very old-fashioned man—­he wanted to fetch her something, and he didn’t seem to care just what.

“Couldn’t I git her a hunk of thet sausage that we brung home?” he begged.

“You loon,” was his answer.  “Are you set on murder?  Do you want to kill her outright?”

This repressed his enthusiasm.  “Never do I,” he declared, “spite of the reward, Samanthy.  Don’t she look like what our little ’un ought to look like if—­she grew to look?”

“You loon!  How could you tell what she ought to have looked like when her own mother never saw her try?  Oh, Josiah,” and the lines of hardship melted into possibilities, “wouldn’t it have been lovely—­if she did—­live—­to look!”

“’Tweren’t your fault—­nor mine, Samanthy.  He knows, and mebby thet’s why He sent this ’un.  Ain’t she purty?  And I don’t care a durn about the sanitarition folks.  Of course—­if we’ve found her—­and they want her——­”

It was a strange sight.  Those two wrinkled old faces peering into the blossom that lay on that feather bed!

“Josiah Hobbs!  You are an old loon!  I can’t see how you kin make out that this is heaven-sent,” and she brushed a fly from the white forehead.

“Oh—­yes—­you—­kin, Samanthy.  Else why did you shoo thet fly?”

“Shet up!  Do you want to rouse her?” and she went over, and pulled down the green curtain with the pink rose border.

“Are you sartin thet—­she’s the one?”

“Didn’t I say I seen her?  Are there so many cornsilk heads around here?  Now, the question is——­”

“Jest what I was a-thinkin’:  The question is——­”

“We kin lock this room—­and put the bars ag’in the shutters.  But I don’t want to scare her.”

“It’s the best, though.  We hev got to make it s’cure.  I don’t ’magine she’ll care fer awhile, any way.  And then we kin tote her back to the sanitation.”

“Well, we’ll see.  Now, you sneak off and I’ll tuck her in.  Poor lamb!  To think that she’s looney!”