"All that way!" exclaimed Bert. "What did they do to you to make you run off?"
The colour rose in Prin's face, and then died away as quickly. She answered, with considerable hesitation,—
"They said I was a thief—they said I had taken something of Lady Millicent's. They were coming to search my box, and I ran away."
"But why did you, Prin?" asked Bert, looking perplexed and troubled. "You should have stayed and let them search your box, then they would have known that you had not stolen it. But now they will most likely think that you've got whatever it was, and taken it away with you. It wasn't like you, Prin, to be so foolish."
"I suppose I did not think of that," she said, looking down.
"You didn't walk from Hampshire, surely?" he said, as his eyes fell on her boots.
She nodded.
"Most of the way," she said. "I didn't dare to take a train on their line, for fear they should telegraph and have me stopped at the station. I lay under a hedge last night, and as soon as it was light, I got up and walked on. Then a carrier's cart overtook me, and I got a lift. It was going to Weybridge, and there I took the train for London."
"You must be dreadfully tired," said Bert, looking compassionately at her; "you'd better get to bed at once."
"Oh," she cried, with a sudden wail of distress, "I wish I had not done it!" Then looking round her fearfully, she added, "You don't think they'll find me here, do you, Bert? Perhaps we had better go somewhere else."