back, stood up, and
regarded his thumb with as much intentness as if he were an Indian fakir
pledged to look at nothing else for a stated number of years. He pinched
the nail, shook his hand, and then, abandoning it as an object of
interest, was about to inflate the mended tyre when I came forward.

"You've hurt yourself," I said.

"I didn't know you were looking," he replied, fixing the air-pump. "Your
back seemed to be turned."

"A girl who hasn't got eyes in the back of her head is incomplete. What
have you done to your hand?"

"Nothing much. Only picked up a splinter somehow. I tried to get it out
and couldn't. It will do when we arrive somewhere."

"Let me try," I said.

"Nonsense! A little flower of a thing like you! Why, you'd faint at the
sight of blood."

"Oh, is it bleeding?" I asked, horrified, and forgetting to hide my
horror.

He laughed. "Only a drop or two. Why, you're as white as your name,
child."

"That's only at the thought," I said. "I don't mind the _sight_,
although I _do_ think if Providence had made blood a pale green or a
pretty blue it would have been less startling than bright red. However,
it's too late to change that now. And if you don't show me your thumb,
I'll have hysterics instantly, and perhaps be discharged by Lady Turnour
on the spot."

At this awful threat, which I must have looked terribly capable of
carrying out, he obeyed without a word.

A horrid little, thin slip of iron had gone deep down between the nail
and the flesh, and large drops of the most sensational crimson were
splashing down on to the ground.

"The idea of your driving like that!" I exclaimed fiercely. But my voice
quivered. "One, two, three!" I said to myself, and then pulled. I wanted
to shut my eyes, but pride forbade, so I kept them as wide open as if my
lids had been propped up with matches. Out came the splinter of metal,
and seeing it in my hand--so long, so sharp--things swam in rainbow
colours for a few seconds; but I was outwardly calm as a Stoic, and
wrapped the thumb in my handkerchief despite my brother's protests.

"Brave child," he said. "Thank you."

I looked up at him, and his eyes had such a beautiful expression that a
queer tenderness began stirring in my heart, just as a young bird stirs
in a nest when it wakes up. I couldn't help having the impression that
he felt the same thing for me at the moment. It was as if our thoughts
rushed together, and then flew away in a hurry, f