"
"I will try," said the nurse.
She went upstairs after her interview with the doctor, and bending over
Sue, took her hot hand and said gently:
"I wish, little Cinderella, you would tell me something about yourself."
"There's naught to tell," said Sue.
"But--you'll forgive me--I am sure there is."
"Ef you was to ask me for ever, I wouldn't tell then," said Sue.
"Ah! I guessed--there is something."
"Yes--some'ut--but I can't bear it--the Woice in the air is so
beautiful."
"What voice?" asked the nurse, who feared that her little patient would
suddenly become delirious.
"It's Big Ben hisself is talkin' to me and to my darling, darling little
brother."
"Oh! you have a little brother, Cinderella?"
"Yus, a cripple. But don't ask me no more. The Woice gives me strength,
and I won't niver, niver tell."
"What does Big Ben say? I don't understand."
"No," said Sue; "and p'r'aps ye're not wanted to understand. It's for me
and for him, poor darling, that Woice is a real comfort."
The nurse left her little charge a few minutes afterwards. But before
she went off duty she spoke to the night nurse, and confessed that she
was anxious about the child, who ought to be recovering, and certainly
would but for this great weight of trouble on her mind.
All these things, which seemed in themselves unimportant, bore directly
on immediate events; for when Connie and Harris arrived at St.
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