“’Tain’t regular croup.  You go after the doctor, Mr. Dudley.”

Patience, frightened by her difficult breathing, would let no one but Lydia touch her.  Under Mrs. Norton’s supervision, she packed the baby in hot water bottles while Lizzie heated water and stoked the fires till the stove doors glowed red.

Amos came back with the doctor about nine o’clock.  Patience was in a stupor.  The doctor sent Lydia away while he made his examination.  The child clenched her fists and walked up and down the livingroom, cheeks scarlet, eyes blazing.  Suddenly she dropped on her knees by the window and lifted her clasped hands to the stars.

“God!  God, up there!” she called.  “If you let her die, I’ll never pray to you again!  Never!  I warned You when You let mother die!”

She remained a moment on her knees, staring at the stars while fragments of Sunday School lore flashed through her mind.  “Our Father who art in heaven,” she said.  “No, that won’t do.  Suffer little children to come unto me.  Oh, no, no.”

The door opened and Lizzie came out, tears-running down her cheeks.  Lydia flew to her.

“They say I got to tell you.  Diphtheritic croup—­her lungs is full—­no hope.”

Lydia struck the kind old hand from her shoulder and dashed out of the house.  She ran through the snow to a giant pine by the gate and beat her fists against it for how long she did not know.  Pain in her bruised hands and the intense cold finally brought her to her senses.  A self-control that was partly inherent and partly the result of too early knowledge of grief and of responsibility came to her rescue.  With a long sigh, she walked steadily into the house and into the room where the baby sister lay in a stupor, breathing stertorously.

The doctor and Amos were there.  Mrs. Norton was now soothing Lizzie in the kitchen, now obeying the doctor’s orders.  Amos did not stir from his chair by the bed, nor speak a word, all that night.  The doctor was in his shirt sleeves, prepared to fight as best he could.

“Go out, Lydia,” said Dr. Fulton, quietly.

“She’ll want me,” replied the child.

The doctor looked at Lydia keenly.  He knew her well.  He had ushered her as well as Patience into the world.  He pulled her to him, with one hand, not relinquishing his hold on the baby’s pulse with the other.

“She’s in a stupor and won’t miss you, Lydia.  She is not suffering at all.  Now, I want you to go to bed like a good girl.”

“I won’t,” said Lydia, quietly.

“Lydia,” the doctor went on, as if he were talking to a grown person, “all your life you will be grateful to me, if I make you obey me now.  I know those wild nerves of yours, too much and too early controlled. Lydia, go to bed!”

Not because she feared him but because some knowledge beyond her years told her of his wisdom, Lydia turned, found Florence Dombey in the living-room and with her and a blanket, crept under her father’s bed, into the farthest corner where she lay wide-eyed until dawn.  Some one closed the door into the room then, and shortly, she fell asleep.