Dimple sat quite still after Florence left her. She did not dare to go downstairs for fear of encountering her mother, and yet, suppose Florence should really mean to go home. How dreadful! She considered the question till she could bear it no longer, and, slowly putting on her own clothes, she crept downstairs, hoping as she went from room to room that she would find Florence. She even peeped cautiously in upon her mother, busy with her sewing, but no Florence was to be seen.
"Perhaps she has started to go home," Dimple said to herself, in real alarm. "Oh, dear, I hope there hasn't been any train along that she could take." She put on her hat, seized an umbrella from the rack, and sallied forth. It was still raining hard, and as she splashed along, the little girl was very miserable.
It was quite a walk to the railway station, and Dimple hurried her steps, fearing she might be too late to intercept her cousin. She entered the waiting-room of the station, and looked anxiously around. No Florence was there. Her heart sank and she turned to go. Florence had really meant what she said. And her aunt and cousins in Baltimore, what would they think of her? The tears began to roll down Dimple's cheeks as she looked up and down the long track. She did not know what to do next. It would be so dreadful to go home and tell her mother that she had driven her cousin away by her rudeness. She was about to turn toward home, when she bethought herself of making some inquiry about the trains; and she entered the waiting-room again.
Standing on tiptoe she asked the ticket agent. "When was the last train to Baltimore?"
"Next train leaves at 4:50," said the man, without looking up.
"Not the next train, but the last train. When did it go?"
"Last train!" the man glanced up. "Last train left at 2:15."
"Thank you." It was with a sense of relief that she heard him give the time. Florence had not left the house so long ago as that. It was now after four, and two hours had not elapsed since they were playing in the garret. So she went slowly out, but suddenly remembered that Florence was not at home. Where was she? Perhaps she was lost. She didn't know her way about very well, Dimple reflected, and she could easily have taken a wrong turn.
"I'll just have to look for her, that's all," thought Dimple; and the little feet pattered along in the rain, getting wetter and wetter each moment.
Up one street and down another went Dimple, but there was no sign of Florence, and the child's repentance grew stronger as she traveled on. Her imagination saw Florence in a dozen different plights, each one worse than the last. Accidents of various kinds, disasters of every possible nature, even the very improbable idea that she had been stolen by gypsies, rose to the child's mind, till, terror stricken, she flew along, scarcely knowing which way she went.