listened. She heard a
very faint clink, as if two small bottles had been knocked together, and
then a little dump, as if one of them had fallen over.

"Glory!" said Alf, still in the low voice that he had used earlier.
"Believe I've got it!"

"Got it? Is there any in it?" Emmy at the same instant was asking.

Alf was sniffing at the little bottle which he had withdrawn from the
cupboard. He then descended carefully from the chair, and held the
uncorked bottle under her nose, for a corroborative sniff. It was about
half full of brandy. Satisfied, he knelt as before, now trying, however,
to force Pa's teeth apart, and rubbing some of the brandy upon the
parted lips.

"This'll do it!" Alf cheerfully and reassuringly cried. "Half a tick.
I'll get some water to wet his head again." He stumbled once more out
into the scullery, and the careful Emmy unconsciously flinched as she
heard the jug struck hard in the darkness against the tap. Her eye was
fixed upon the jug as it was borne brimming and splashing back to her
side. She could not help feeling such housewifely anxiety even amid the
tremors of her other acute concern. As Alf knelt he lavishly sprinkled
some more water upon Pa's face, and set the jug ready to Emmy's hand,
working with a quiet deftness that aroused her watchful admiration. He
was here neither clumsy nor rough: if his methods were as primitive as
the means at hand his gentle treatment of the senseless body showed him
to be adaptable to an emergency. How she loved him! Pride gleamed in
Emmy's eyes. She could see in him the eternal handy-man of her delight,
made for husbandhood and as clearly without nonsense as any working wife
could have wished.

Pa's nightshirt was blackened with great splashes of water, and the
soaked parts clung tightly to his breast. At the neck it was already
open, and they both thought they could see at this moment a quick
contraction of the throat. An additional augury was found in the fact
that Alf simultaneously had succeeded in dribbling some of the brandy
between Pa's teeth, and although some of it ran out at the corners of
his mouth and out on to his cheeks, some also was retained and would
help to revive him. Alf gave another quick nod, this time one of
satisfaction.

"Feel his heart!" Emmy whispered. He did so. "Can you feel it?"

"It's all right. Famous!"

Pa gave a little groan. He seemed to stir. Emmy felt his shoulders move
against her knees; and she looked quickly