Page:Robins - My Little Sister.djvu/63



I COULD not speak when I reached the village. They gave me water.

I had in any case to wait a moment till the post-master was free, for I could not use the telephone myself. My mother had a horror of our touching the public one. She had spoken with disgust of the mouthpiece that everybody breathed into. "Full of germs!" Then it must be bad for other people, we said. "Other people must take their chance." I remembered that as I leaned against the counter, panting, while the postmaster wrote out a telegram. We were "taking the chance" now. Such a little thing—my not knowing how to telephone. Yet it might cost my mother her life. The postmaster rang up Brighton.

The doctor was out.

What could be done but leave a message!

I would go to the Helmstones and ask for a motor-car. Why had I not thought of that before?