He threw himself from the saddle and hurried into the house, and the next minute two more followed at the same headlong pace.
These were Cal and Dr.Barton, and they also dismounted in hot haste and disappeared from her sight beneath the veranda.

Certainly something very dreadful had happened.

Oh would nobody come to tell her! The minutes dragged their slow length along seeming like hours.

She lay back in her chair in an agony of suspense, the perspiration standing in cold drops on her brow.
But the sound of wheels roused her and looking out she saw the Oaks and Ion carriages drive up, young Horace and Rosie alight from the one, Mr.
Travilla and Elsie from the other.
"Oh!" thought Molly, "Cousin Elsie will be sure to think of me directly and I shall not be left much longer in this horrible suspense." Her confidence was not misplaced.

Not many minutes had elapsed when her door was softly opened, a light step crossed the floor and a sweet fair face, full of tender compassion, bent over the grief-stricken girl.
Molly tried to speak; her tongue refused its office, but Elsie quickly answered the mute questioning of the wild, frightened, anguished eyes.
"There is life," she said, taking the cold hands in hers, "life in both; and 'while there is life there is hope.' Our dear old grandfather has a broken leg and arm and a few slight cuts and bruises, but is restored to consciousness now, and able to speak.