Heart of Gold | Page 7

corner seat by the window in Miss Phelps' room
was vacant for the first time that year, and the teacher looked up in
surprise when no familiar voice answered, "Present," when she called
Peace Greenfield's name.
"She fell off the roof of Smiley's house," volunteered one scholar.

"And broke her back," supplemented another.
"What!" shrieked the horrified teacher, with a strange, sickening fear
clutching at her heart.
The door opened, and the school principal entered the room, looking
worn and distraught.
"Miss Lisk," cried the teacher, turning eagerly to her superior, "the
children tell me that Peace Greenfield has fallen from some roof and
broken her back."
"O, it's not as bad as that," responded the older woman promptly. "She
has had a nasty fall and is--hurt. How badly, the doctor is unable yet to
say, but we hope she will soon be with us again." Lowering her voice
so none but the teacher could hear, she added, "The physician is afraid
that her spine is injured."
"Oh!" cried Miss Phelps, too shocked for further words.
"It is too bad such a thing should happen to her," continued Miss Lisk
sadly. "She is such a lovable child, the life of her home."
Had anyone paid such a tribute to the lively Peace on the previous day,
her teacher would merely have raised her eyebrows doubtfully; but
with the memory of that flushed, joyous face still so vividly before her,
and with the sound of the eager, childish prattle still ringing in her ears,
she nodded her head in assent, and turned back to the day's duties with
a heaviness of heart that was overwhelming. With that restless, active
figure gone from its accustomed corner, the sun seemed to have set in
mid-day and left the whole world in darkness.
CHAPTER II
THE SCRAP-BOOK BRIGADE
When Peace awoke to her surroundings again, she was lying in the
gorgeously draped bed of the Flag Room with old Dr. Coates bending

over her, and she startled the worthy gentleman by asking in sprightly
tones, "Well, Doctor, how are you? It's been a long time since you've
been to call on me, isn't it? Do you think I have cracked a rib?"
"No, little girl," he answered soberly, but his wrinkled old face
brightened visibly at the sound of her cheery voice. "I think you have
put a kink in your back."
"Will it be all right soon?"
"We hope so, curly pate."
"By tomorrow?"
"O, dear, no! Not for--days." He could not bring himself to tell her that
it might be weeks before he could even determine how badly the little
back was hurt.
"Mercy!" she wailed in consternation, for bed held no charms for that
active body. "And must I stay in bed all that while?"
"My dear child," he answered gravely, "do you realize that you are the
luckiest girl in seven counties tonight?"
"How?" she asked curiously, forgetting her lament in her wonder at his
words.
"It's a miracle that you were not killed outright."
"Well, Johnny dared me."
"And you couldn't pass up a dare?"
She shook her head.
"Well, now my girlie must take her medicine."
Peace looked startled. "I didn't 'xpect to fall," she murmured, and two
tears glistened in her big brown eyes.

The doctor relented. "There, there, little one," he comforted, "don't feel
badly. We'll soon have you up and about--perhaps," he added under his
breath.
So he left her smiling and cheerful, but his own heart was heavy as he
descended the stairs after the long examination was ended, a pall of
anxiety hung over the whole household when the door closed behind
his broad back. Peace crippled perhaps for life, perhaps never to walk
without crutches again! It was too dreadful to be true. Peace,--their gay
little butterfly! Peace, whose feet seemed like wings! They never
walked, but danced along with the lightness of a fairy, tripping, flitting,
never still. What a calamity!
"But Dr. Coates says it is too soon to know for certain yet," Hope
reminded them, trying to find a ray of encouragement to cheer the
anxious household, and they seized upon that straw with desperation,
gradually taking heart once more, and trying to shake off the dreadful
fear that Peace would never romp or dance about the house again.
And it really seemed as if the white-haired physician's fears were
groundless; for after the first few days when the slightest touch made
the little sufferer whimper with pain, she seemed to get better. The
soreness wore away, the drawn lines around the mouth smoothed
themselves out, the rosy color came back to the round cheeks and the
sound of the well-known laughter floated from room to room. Peace
was undoubtedly better, and even Dr. Coates forgot to look grave as he
came