As he recalled all this, Keith forgot to listen to his parents, who went
on discussing so intently that he was able to leave his corner and reach
the door to the kitchen unnoticed. An irresistible desire to see Granny
at once had seized him. Back of it lay a vaguely sensed mixture of
curiosity and sympathy.
Granny was in her favourite place beside the kitchen sofa, seated on a
footstool almost as large as an ordinary chair, but somewhat lower. That
stool was the one bone of contention between her and Keith, because he
was carrying it off as often as he could get at it. Turned upside down,
with Keith seated snugly between its four legs, it became a sleigh
drawn across icy plains by a team of swift reindeer, or a ship rocking
mightily on the high seas.
The kitchen was full of a peculiar sweetish smell, by which Keith knew
without looking that Granny was dressing the old wound on her left leg
that had developed "the rose" and would not heal. She was leaning far
over, busy with a bandage which she wound tightly about her leg, from
the ankle to the knee. The boy sniffed the familiar smell with a vague
sense of discomfort, which, however, did not prevent him from going up
to the grandmother and putting one arm about her neck.
"Old hurt is hard to mend," she muttered quoting one of the old saws
always on her lips.
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