sister."

"He would be sure to use his foot," Grizel maintained, "if you once
let him rise from his chair; you know they all do." And Gemmell agreed
that she was right. So she managed to give Tommy as irksome a time as
possible.

But next day she called. To go through another day without letting him
see how despicable she thought him was beyond her endurance. Elspeth
was a little stiff at first, but Tommy received her heartily and with
nothing in his manner to show that she had hurt his finer feelings.
His leg (the wrong leg, as Grizel remembered at once) was extended on
a chair in front of him; but instead of nursing it ostentatiously as
so many would have done, he made humourous remarks at its expense.
"The fact is," he said cheerily, "that so long as I don't move I never
felt better in my life. And I daresay I could walk almost as well as
either of you, only my tyrant of a doctor won't let me try." "He
told me you had behaved splendidly," said Grizel, "while he was
reducing the dislocation. How brave you are! You could not have
endured more stoically though there had been nothing the matter with
it."

"It was soon over," Tommy replied lightly. "I think Elspeth suffered
more than I."

Elspeth told the story of his heroism. "I could not stay in the room,"
she said; "it was too terrible." And Grizel despised too
tender-hearted Elspeth for that; she was so courageous at facing pain
herself. But Tommy had guessed that Elspeth was trembling behind the
door, and he had called out, "Don't cry, Elspeth; I am all right; it