Putting her finger on her lip as a gesture of silence, she drew Camilla to her feet.
"I will go down with you," she whispered, and they passed together out of the room, but Camilla's mind dwelt on the children.
"Don't separate me from them," she said; her voice was so changed, so dull, so hoarse. "Don't stand between me and the children," she said almost passionately.
"If you will go downstairs," said Caroline, quietly and gently, "I will bring the children down. I don't think they will wake. Make the bed ready and turn the lights low. I think we will put them into the blankets, they will not feel the cold that way."
At first she had been on the point of suggesting that Camilla should stay in the nursery and take her bed, but she quickly felt that it would be a wise thing to occupy the other woman a little, for even to her untutored eye there were unmistakable signs of acute and dangerous mental tension about Camilla at this moment.
"If you will go and make everything ready and come up again, you might carry Baby down," she whispered.
It made her heart ache sharply to see the pitiful eagerness with which Camilla did her bidding.
When the mother came back again she had divested herself of her silk underskirt, so that there should be as little noise as possible.
"Give me Betty," she whispered; then she pushed Caroline gently on one side. "I can lift her myself," she said, "I have done it before."
She almost staggered under the burden of the sleeping child as she took it out of the bed; but the colour came back to her face, and her eyes lost that wild look as she held Betty to her heart.