"If it is so really," he said in an odd, unsteady voice, "he brings bad news. Something so bad has happened that he could not break it to me in a letter."
It flashed into Eustace's mind that Bob had looked awfully grave and queer—if Bob it really were, and no delusion! Suppose his father should go to the gate and find no one awaiting him—what then?
"You—you will go and see if he is there?" faltered the boy nervously.
"I am going at once," said Mr. Orban. "When you are dressed yourself, go down into the drawing-room as usual, as if nothing had happened." He opened the door into Mrs. Orban's room and said lightly, "There's a man just called to see me, dear. If I happen to be detained, make my apologies to the old people, and ask them not to wait dinner for me."
Mrs. Orban made a cheery, unsuspecting response, and he and Eustace left the room.
The twins and the Dixon pair always assembled in the drawing-room with every one before dinner was served, and there they awaited the summons to dessert, as a rule with books, in dreary silence.
When Eustace came down he found every one waiting for dinner. Mr. Orban was not yet in, and Mr. Chase would not hear of beginning the meal without him.
"His friend can't in conscience keep him late at such an hour," he said. "Of course we will wait."
No one was very talkative. It seemed to Eustace as if something of the coming shadow were creeping over the community before the bad news could even be dreamed of by any one except himself. There was just the sort of deadly calm and stillness over everything that comes before a thunderstorm.
Nesta had curled herself up in a deep window-seat, well out of sight. Eustace guessed she had made such a fright of herself with crying she was afraid to show her face. He sat near the door into the great conservatory with a book, pretending to read. Really he could do nothing but wonder what terrible thing could be going to happen next.