That same night—the night that Sophy spent so miserably on the express that was taking her to him—he managed to dress himself and find his way out of the huge house without rousing any one. One of the housemaids had been sent to stay in the dressing-room next his, but she was a sound, healthy sleeper, and did not hear the boy's cautious movements. He crept downstairs in his stocking-feet, boots in hand. His overcoat had been put away. He went out into the dark, chill, misty night, dressed only in thin serge. At first he could see nothing, then bit by bit the shrubbery and trees revealed themselves ink on inky-grey. The crunching of the gravel helped him to find his way. His heart thumped sickeningly but high. He was free, free! On his way back to his mother. When he had groped some fifty yards from the house, he sat down on the ground to put on his boots. As he laced them he looked wrathfully back at the black mass of the grim old house. Two lighted hall windows in the floor above, and the lighted glass above the front door, gave it the appearance of a huge staring face, with luminous mouth and eyes. It seemed glowering at him like an ogre. He scrambled up, feeling rather queer and little in the lap of the dark, empty night, then trudged sturdily on, guided by the crunching of the gravel, as he strayed to right or left.
All at once, the trees began to sigh and creak—big drops struck his face—at first spatteringly, then thicker together. Within half an hour of his leaving the house, a heavy, wind-swept rain was pelting down; ten minutes more and he was soaked to the skin.
Now it was that he began to fear for his money, which was more than half in notes. He clenched his hands tightly over as much of it as he could grasp, and plodded on determinedly. But the steady pelting of the rain bewildered him. He wandered from the driveway—tried to find it again, with hands and feet this time. Blown twigs and leaves began to strike him. He walked against a tree—clung to it a moment, panting. Then groped his way on again. But now he was hopelessly lost in the big Park. A great, soggy mass of bracken stopped him. He skirted it—walked against more trees. He would not admit in his fierce, dogged little heart that he was lost. He kept rehearsing what he would say to the station-master: "A first-class ticket to London, please. Here's the money."
For nearly three hours the boy groped and stumbled in that maze of trees through the driving rain. For some time he had been saying earnest little prayers:
"Our Father who art in heaven ... please help me to get back to my mother. Our Father ... please. Our Father ... please...."
When they found him he was lying unconscious on the sodden grass under an elm—both hands clenched fast upon as much of the notes and silver in his pockets as he could grasp.
When he had been put to bed, and roused at last he was delirious. He began calling frantically, "My money! my money!" They gave it to him. Then had begun that monotonous chant of: "A first-class ticket to London, please.... A ticket to London.... Here's the money.... I've got the money."
This was why Bellamy did not wonder that Lady Wychcote fainted when he told her that Bobby might die.