She got up out of her chair.
“Oh, you have done me good!” she cried. “Look, what was that?”
Jack had seen it, too; it was as if the sky had winked. They waited in silence, and in a few minutes came the growl of answering thunder. Jeannie stretched out her arms with a great sigh.
“Thunder!” she cried. “Perhaps there will be rain. How I have prayed for that. You don’t know what it may mean to us. Well, what is it, Pool?”
“Mrs. Raymond is here, Miss,” said he, “and would like to speak to you.”
“Very well, I will come in. Wait here, Mr. Collingwood; I will see what she wants.”
Jeannie went indoors with a new briskness of step and found Mrs. Raymond standing helplessly in the middle of the drawing-room.
“Oh, Miss Avesham,” she said, “will you come? Maria is ill, and I can’t find any doctor in. So I thought, if you would be so kind, you would come and look at her, as I heard you have been working at the hospital.”
“When was she taken ill?” asked Jeannie.
“She wasn’t well yesterday at lunch, and had no appetite. And my husband said it was all nonsense and took her out for a walk. She was very bad last night, but he said she would be all right in the morning, and now she’s no better.”