Jessie’s heart almost stood still with fright.  “The p’lice,” she gasped, “for mother!—­oh, what has happened?”

“There’s been an accident to your father; there was a bit of a fight in the train coming home from the races, and—­and he got flung against the door, and it opened—­and he fell out.”

A low cry of horror broke from Jessie.  Instinct told her that the news was very serious.  If her father had not been severely injured—­ or worse, the man would not have been so upset.

“Is—­is—­” she gasped.

“He is taken to the hospital,” responded the man quickly, almost as though he was anxious to check her next question.

“Ah! there is mother!” cried Jessie in a tone of infinite relief, as she saw her appear at the gate.  Mrs. Lang looked very white and very tired, and an expression of vague fear came into her eyes as they fell on pale, trembling Jessie, and the stranger, also pale and evidently greatly agitated.  She lived always in a state of dread of some disaster or disgrace, and instinct told her that one or the other had come.

The man went down the steps to meet her.  Jessie stood waiting at the door; she would have gone forward too, but that she was shaking so, she felt she should never get down the steps.  So she stood there supporting herself by the door, and watched her mother’s face, and saw the shocked look that came over it.  She could not hear all that was said, but she caught fragments of sentences, “Come at once”—­ “alive when I left.”  “Searching him for his name and address, but I knew Harry—­and came along to prepare you.  He’s at St. Mary’s.”

Mrs. Lang came up to the door to Jessie, holding out her basket and umbrella for her to take.  She dragged her limbs almost like a paralyzed woman, and her eyes looked dazed.  “I’ll be back—­as soon as I can,” she said; but her lips seemed stiff and scarcely able to move.  “You look after the house.”  She was turning away, when she suddenly turned, and stooping, kissed Jessie for the first time in her life; and Jessie, looking up, flung her arms around her stepmother’s neck and kissed her in return.  This new trouble had brought them very close.

With tear-blinded eyes Jessie turned and groped her way back into the house to face that hardest of all trials—­suspense.  Slowly, slowly she dragged herself down to the kitchen to see to the fire, then up the stairs to Miss Patch to tell her the news and wait.

Before long, though, they both crept down to the kitchen, so as to be at hand when needed; but Jessie could not keep still, the suspense was hard to bear, and made her restless.  She wandered aimlessly from fire to window and back again.  They talked a little, speculating as to what was happening, and what they should hear, and Jessie lit the lamps as soon as the dimness gave her the slightest excuse.  A great dread of troubles and changes, and they knew not what else, filled them both.