Page:What Katy Did.djvu/276

262 "Oh, Papa!" said Katy, "it's no matter if it takes a year—if only I get well at last."

How happy she was that night—too happy to sleep. Papa noticed the dark circles under her eyes in the morning, and shook his head.

"You must be careful," he told her, "or you'll be laid up again. A course of fever would put you back for years."

Katy knew Papa was right, and she was careful, though it was by no means easy to be so with that new life tingling in every limb. Her progress was slow, as Dr. Carr had predicted. At first she only stood on her feet a few seconds, then a minute, then five minutes, holding tightly all the while by the chair. Next she ventured to let go the chair, and stand alone. After that she began to walk a step at a time, pushing a chair before her, as children do when they are learning the use of their feet. Clover and Elsie hovered about her as she moved, like anxious mammas. It was droll, and a little pitiful, to see tall Katy with her feeble, unsteady progress, and the active figures of the little sisters following her protectingly. But Katy did not consider it either droll or pitiful;