His mother looked at him, and her heart stood still.
"What's the matter ?" she asked.
"I'm badly, mother!" he replied.

"Mr.Jordan gave me five shillings for a Christmas-box!" He handed it to her with trembling hands.

She put it on the table.
"You aren't glad!" he reproached her; but he trembled violently.
"Where hurts you ?" she said, unbuttoning his overcoat.
It was the old question.
"I feel badly, mother." She undressed him and put him to bed.

He had pneumonia dangerously, the doctor said.
"Might he never have had it if I'd kept him at home, not let him go to Nottingham ?" was one of the first things she asked.
"He might not have been so bad," said the doctor.
Mrs.Morel stood condemned on her own ground.
"I should have watched the living, not the dead," she told herself.
Paul was very ill.

His mother lay in bed at nights with him; they could not afford a nurse.