"I'm not fit for any one to speak to. It's the curse of Cain," he repeated.
Meantime Merle, who was swift of foot and had won many long-distance races at school sports, flew back to Chagmouth with record speed, and carried her news to Grimbal's Farm. Mrs. Penruddock was in the kitchen. She ran at once and called her husband from where he was working in the orchard.
"I'll put the horse in the trap," he said briefly. "We'll go by the upper road, and then slip across the fields to the cave. Best take his overcoat and a rug."
Merle went with them, not that she could be of any special use, but because she simply could not stop behind, and after all she was able to render a service, for she held the horse while Mr. and Mrs. Penruddock hurried down the fields to the cave. They came back after a short time half-carrying Bevis along, with Mavis, looking extremely grave, walking beside them. They lifted him into the trap, and drove him home, meeting Dr. Tremayne on the very doorstep.
The Doctor shook his head when he heard of the nights in the damp cave.
"Get him to bed, and we'll do our best," was his verdict. "He has youth and strength on his side at any rate. Please God we'll pull him round again. I've seen people worse than he is, Mrs. Penruddock, so keep your heart up. While there's life there's hope, remember. That's a proverb I always tell my patients, and one of the best that was ever invented."
"I know, Doctor," gulped poor Mrs. Penruddock. "I know if anybody can pull him through, you will. But it's hard to see him looking like this all the same—Bevis, who's hardly had a day's illness in his life before."
CHAPTER XX
A Confession
All the next week Bevis lay desperately ill, and in the gravest danger. Every morning Dr. Tremayne motored over to Grimbal's Farm to see him, and arrived back with the same unsatisfactory report. Mavis and Merle, who waited anxiously for the daily bulletin, would run in from school at lunch-time hoping for better news. When Saturday came round again they begged to be allowed to go to Chagmouth as usual.