"Don't you think as you ought to have some breakfast, miss, and rest a bit? There'll be a message perhaps from Mrs. Lancing by-and-by."

Caroline picked up her hat and her gloves.

"Thank you, I will come," she said.

"Look here," said Broxbourne, following her quickly and scowling at the servant, "I'd like to say something more to you about this. When can I see you?"

She leaned against the doorway and rested with her eyes shut for half a moment, then she looked at him.

"I am going back to Yelverton now, directly."

He paused a moment, and then he said, in a dogged sort of way--

"Then I'll go to Yelverton, too. Now I'll take myself off."

As he pa.s.sed her, Caroline put out her hand and caught his arm feebly.

"Sir Samuel, you will not----" words failed her.

There was a pompous air about him as he answered that broken sentence.

"I will do nothing till I have seen you again. Will that please you?"

She could only bend her head. As he went heavily down the stairs her eyes closed again.

Like a blind, broken-down creature, she turned into the drawing-room once more, and as she fell into a chair she lay there inert, too prostrate to move or even to think consciously for a little while at least.

CHAPTER XV

The dark green blind flapped lazily to and fro against the lower part of the open window, letting in occasional streaks of golden light, and stirring the delicate fronds of the fern that, with a pot of heliotrope and some bowls of flowers, stood on the table at the foot of the bed.

Caroline lay and watched for those fugitive glimpses of sunshine and sun-bathed trees.

It must be very lovely out in the garden, so she mused, dreamily; only it was such a long, long way to get there, and here it was so pleasantly restful, so calm, so conducive to dreams.

A great many birds had congregated on the big beech tree close to her windows; there was a swallow's nest just under the eaves of the roof, and a great twittering went on every now and then. Caroline could picture the cl.u.s.ter of yellow, wide-open beaks, and the industrious mother voyaging backwards and forwards, always with some toothsome morsel for one of those hungry mouths in her own beak.

"I think tiny swallows are very greedy," she said to herself, sleepily.

"They are never satisfied."

And some one answered her--a small voice, from the floor, apparently.

"Caloline ... Caloline ... is you going to wake up.... Oh, _do_ wake up, Caloline!"

The voice was plaintive almost to tears.

Caroline opened her eyes, paused, and then, with an effort, pushed herself forward, resting on her elbow.

"Is there somebody there?" she asked, in such a funny, wavering voice.

For answer a very hot and a very small hand came creeping over the white sheet like a little mouse.

"It's me ... Babsy.... They've sented me away all the time, nasty unkind peoples. But I crawled in, and I _do_ want you, Caloline."

"Climb up," said Caroline, faintly.

It was a stupendous undertaking, entailing much slipping and dragging at the bed-clothes, but at last a small, hot, dishevelled little person had crawled close to the pillow and was kissing the white face lying there and cuddling a weak hand and arm as if it were a doll.

And then confidences followed.

"Betty's dog has comed; he's a awful duck, but she won't let me have nothing of him. Isn't she selfish?"

"I will give you a dog, sweetheart."

"A really one?"

"A real one."

"Nice, _dear_ Caloline!"

The little soft face pressed close to the white one.

"But not a wool-fur dog?"

"No, a real one."

Baby lay and stared dreamily about the room.

"I'll give him jam," she said.

Caroline laughed.

"Fancy a real dog eating jam!"

"Fancy a real growned-up thing going to sleep for all the days."

"I am very sorry," said Caroline, humbly.

The door was pushed open here in the softest way possible, and a voice whispered cautiously from the aperture----

"Baby.... Baby...."

Baby giggled, and put her finger up in a warning fashion, but Betty was not deceived.

"I know you're here," she said, "and you didn't ought to come. You know what Aunty Brenny said. You was to leave Caroline alone."