ot in th' way. So I kicked out
hard--then--she," he gulped back a shudder, "she _yelled_!"

Ella was suddenly galvanized into action. She was on her feet, with one
lithe, pantherlike movement--the child held tight in her arms.

"Yer kicked her," she said softly--and the gentleness of her voice was
ominous. "Yer kicked her! An' she yelled--" For the first time the full
significance of it struck her. "_She yelled_?" she questioned, whirling
to Rose-Marie; "yer don't mean as she made a _sound_?"

Rose-Marie nodded dumbly. It was Jim's voice that went on with the story.

"She ain't dead," he told Ella, piteously. "She ain't dead. An'--I
promise yer true--I'll never do such a thing again. I promise yer true!"

Ella took a step toward him. Her face was suddenly lined, and old. "If
she dies," she told him, "_if she dies_..." she hesitated, and
then--"Much yer promises mean," she shrilled, "much yer promises--"

Rose-Marie had been watching Jim's face. Almost without meaning to she
interrupted Ella's flow of speech.

"I think that he means what he says," she told Ella slowly. "I think that
he means ... what he says."

For she had seen the birth of something--_that might have been soul_--in
Jim's haggard eyes.

The child in Ella's arms stirred, weakly, and was still again. But the
movement, slight as it was, made the girl forget her brother. Her dark
head bent above the fair one.

"Honey," she whispered, "yer goin' ter get well fer Ella--ain't yer? Yer
goin' ter get well--"

The door swung open with a startling suddenness, and Rose-Marie sprang
forward, her hands outstretched. Framed in the battered wood stood
Bennie--the tears streaking his face--and behind him was the Young
Doctor. So tall he seemed, so capable, so strong, standing there, that
Rose-Marie felt as if her troubles had been lifted, magically, from her
shoulders. All at once she ceased to be afraid--ceased to question the
ways of the Almighty. All at once she felt that Lily would get
better--that the Volskys would be saved to a better life. And all at
once she knew something else. And the consciousness of it looked from
her wide eyes.

"You!" she breathed. "_You_!"

And, though she had sent for him, herself, she felt a glad sort of
surprise surging through her heart.

The Young Doctor's glance, in her direction, was eloquent. But as his
eyes saw the child in Ella's arms his expression became impersonal,
again, concentrated, and alert. With one stri