"I will tell her, dear, and how sorry you are."
"Perhaps she won't be so kind to me then; she will think me so wicked."
"She was never unkind when Bessie and I were naughty: I am sure she won't be to you." Then raising her voice she said, "Lena wants to write a letter home to-night, please, Miss Gifford."
"No, dear, that must wait till to-morrow; little girls with headaches must keep quiet," was the answer.
With this Lena had to be content. In truth she was not sorry to have nothing more to do that evening but rest quietly, feeling thankful that she had taken that difficult first step in the right direction.
CHAPTER XI.
CONCLUSION.
Lena's fears that she too was going to have the fever proved only too true, for by the next day she was really ill.
All she had gone through for the last few weeks—the fear of discovery, and misery of concealment, joined with the knowledge of how wrongly she was behaving—had tried the child. Though, alas! she had been, as all children are, naughty over and over again, she had never before concealed a fault and continued to do so, as she had now done week after week; and the continual struggle that had gone on in her mind between truth and right, and the pride and jealousy for love, that were such strong features of her character, had told upon body as well as mind, and made her fall an easy prey to the low fever that had broken out in the village and neighbourhood of Sidcombe; and for the next few days she had but a very dim and hazy idea of what was going on around her.
Fortunately the attack was in a mild form, and the weather was much cooler than it had been before the fever broke out, heavy rain having fallen, which cooled the air and revived the sick and drooping, and the doctor was soon able to pronounce his little patient on the high road to recovery.