Page:O'Higgins--The Adventures of Detective Barney.djvu/137

 the blink,” he sighed, and sank back in her arms again, drowsily.

“Help me put him on the couch, Annie,” she said.

The rest was between waking and sleeping. They carried him to a roomy leather couch beside the fire-place, and made him comfortable with cushions, and bandaged his head, and took off his wet clothing, and wrapped him in warm blankets. He was fast asleep when they were pulling off his shoes. He was big for his age, but his mouth pouted in his dreams like a child’s; and Mary Langton, flushing a little, bent over him maternally as she tucked the blanket under his bare, boyish shoulders, and her hand lingered in a comforting touch of pity on his round young neck.

There were three to sit down for breakfast in the Langton bungalow, next morning; and one of them was Barney with a clean bandage fastened diagonally over his forehead and his