distended she whirled about to face a small boy who knelt upon the ground
behind her bench.

To Rose-Marie the details of the small boy's appearance came back, later,
with an amazing clarity. Later she could have described his dark, sullen
eyes, his mouth with its curiously grim quirk at one corner, his shock of
black hair and his ragged coat. But at the moment she had the ability to
see only one thing--the scrawny gray kitten that the boy had tied to the
iron leg of the bench; the shrinking kitten that the boy was torturing
with a cold, relentless cruelty.

It shrieked again--with an almost human cry--as she started around the
bench toward it. And the wild throbbing of her heart told her that she
was witnessing, for the first time, a phase of human nature of which she
had never dreamed.




V

ROSE-MARIE COMES TO THE RESCUE


Rose-Marie's hand upon the small boy's coat collar was not gentle. With
surprising strength, for she was small and slight, she jerked him aside.

"You wicked child!" she exclaimed, and the Young Doctor would have
chuckled to hear her tone. "You wicked child, what are you doing?"