In the Way by Grace Livingston Hill

been completely shaken by her excitement and fall. Indeed the poor child had been working beyond her strength for two weeks, in her eagerness to get things done just right, and there had been no one to restrain her. As she talked she could not keep the tears from rolling down her cheeks, she who never cried before people. She remembered it afterward, and rebuked herself for her weakness.
                  Joseph straightened up and looked at her.
                  “You fixed that room for me?” he said, such utter amazement in his voice that his sister almost laughed afterward with joy to think of it. She had the pleasure of her surprise after all in thinking of the expression on his face then.
                  “You never fixed that all up for me,” he said stupidly, looking down at her as if she must be a little out of her head. “Why I'm just a—just a—Nobody ever does things for me.”
                  “Yes, they do, Joseph! David and I do,” she laughed, her tears shining like a mist before the sun, and she caught one of her brother's great rough, red hands and kissed it.
                  He felt a queer kind of a sensation in his own eyes then, and to cover it he stooped once more and said:
                  “We must get you home. Where are you hurt?” She took his help then and tried to rise, but now the terrific pain in her ankle asserted itself, and she turned quite white and sank back again. “Where—what is it?” questioned Joseph anxiously.
                  “Oh, it's my ankle, and I suppose it might be a sprain. I have always thought it was so silly for people to get their ankles sprained, and now I've done it. Oh, it hurts dreadfully, and we're a long way from home, aren't we?”
                  “Well, not so far but what I could carry you, I guess, only I'm afraid it'll be hard on you; and what'll we do with this concern?” pointing to the down-fallen bicycle. “It ain't very safe to leave it here if you ever care to see it again. I guess I'd better leave you long enough to borrow a wagon.”
                  “Oh, don't!” said Ruth, rising again with sudden energy, which sent the pain shooting through her ankle. “I'm afraid that awful dog would come again,” and she shuddered at the thought. “If you think you can screw those handle bars on tight, perhaps I could get on and manage with your help to ride it home. I suppose it was very reckless of me to start out when I had screwed things up myself. I never put it together before.”
                  Joseph stooped and raised the fallen machine. It was almost as mysterious a thing to have to do with as a young woman. He had never seen one save at a distance before. There was but one in the village, and that was owned by a youth who spent his time away from home, at college, almost entirely. He was not a young man of Joseph's immediate social circle either.
                  With Ruth's directions he was able to make all the repairs necessary, and finally, with much care and not a little pain, Ruth was placed on the saddle, her lame foot held in as comfortable a position as possible, while with her brother's help and her one well foot she was able slowly to propel the machine. It was a slow and painful ride. They took down the bars of the woodlot fence, and went by a little, winding, unused road, which led among the trees, but straight across lots to their home. Ruth was at least shielded from the eyes of the village gossips, and thus her downfall and untriumphal return were not proclaimed from the village house-tops. Mrs. Chatterton missed a moral for her sermon on bicycles, and Eliza Barnes watched in vain for the spinning figure down the road.
                  David was just driving into the gateway as they reached the barnyard entrance, and he could scarcely believe his eyes to see the prodigal brother