Careful as Mr. Grant was, Jill could have screamed with pain as he lifted her; but she set her lips and bore it with the courage of a little Indian; for all the lads were looking on, and Jill was proud to show that a girl could bear as much as a boy.  She hid her face in the coat as soon as she was settled, to hide the tears that would come, and by the time Jack was placed beside her, she had quite a little cistern of salt water stored up in Ed’s coat-pocket.

Then the mournful procession set forth, Mr. Grant driving the oxen, the girls clustering about the interesting invalids on the sled, while the boys came behind like a guard of honor, leaving the hill deserted by all but Joe, who had returned to hover about the fatal fence, and poor “Thunderbolt,” split asunder, lying on the bank to mark the spot where the great catastrophe occurred.

Chapter II

Two Penitents

Jack and Jill never cared to say much about the night which followed the first coasting party of the season, for it was the saddest and the hardest their short lives had ever known.  Jack suffered most in body; for the setting of the broken leg was such a painful job, that it wrung several sharp cries from him, and made Frank, who helped, quite weak and white with sympathy, when it was over.  The wounded head ached dreadfully, and the poor boy felt as if bruised all over, for he had the worst of the fall.  Dr. Whiting spoke cheerfully of the case, and made so light of broken legs, that Jack innocently asked if he should not be up in a week or so.

“Well, no; it usually takes twenty-one days for bones to knit, and young ones make quick work of it,” answered the doctor, with a last scientific tuck to the various bandages, which made Jack feel like a hapless chicken trussed for the spit.

“Twenty-one days!  Three whole weeks in bed!  I shouldn’t call that quick work,” groaned the dismayed patient, whose experience of illness had been limited.

“It is a forty days’ job, young man, and you must make up your mind to bear it like a hero.  We will do our best; but next time, look before you leap, and save your bones.  Good-night; you’ll feel better in the morning.  No jigs, remember;” and off went the busy doctor for another look at Jill, who had been ordered to bed and left to rest till the other case was attended to.

Any one would have thought Jack’s plight much the worse, but the doctor looked more sober over Jill’s hurt back than the boy’s compound fractures; and the poor little girl had a very bad quarter of an hour while he was trying to discover the extent of the injury.

“Keep her quiet, and time will show how much damage is done,” was all he said in her hearing; but if she had known that he told Mrs. Pecq he feared serious consequences, she would not have wondered why her mother cried as she rubbed the numb limbs and placed the pillows so tenderly.