Angel knelt down by the bedside, and put her earnest petition that Dora's life might be spared into simple words; then she repeated the Lord's prayer, and Gerald, though he uttered no sound, joined with her in his heart.
The storm increased in fury, so that the children thought it extremely doubtful if Reginald Hope would keep his word and return to Haresdown House that night. At last, when they had given up expecting him, there was a ring at the front door bell, and Polly went to answer it.
It was not Reginald, however, but his father, who explained that Mrs. Mickle had asked him to call and see Gerald, for she felt very anxious about him, especially as Mr. Willis was from home.
"How's Dora?" asked Gerald, almost breathless with suspense, as the doctor entered his room.
"Better," was the prompt response, "and sleeping peacefully, I'm pleased to say. And how are you after your ducking, my boy? That son of mine ought not to have taken you to the clay pits. I had warned him not to go there."
"I had been forbidden to go there too," Gerald admitted.
"Humph!"
The doctor made no other comment. He felt Gerald's pulse, took his temperature, administered a dose of soothing medicine which he had brought with him, and then went downstairs, followed by Mrs. Vallance, who thanked him for calling.
"The boy will most probably be all right to-morrow," he told her; "you have done everything that was necessary under the circumstances; he is not in the least feverish, and very likely will not even have a cold as punishment for his disobedience. I shall send Reginald to a good, strict boarding-school next term, where I hope he will be taught to obey." And the doctor went out into the storm again, whilst the housekeeper returned to Gerald's room.
Now that his mind was easy about Dora, the boy was inclined to rest, so Mrs. Vallance and Angel left him to himself, and ten minutes later he had forgotten all his troubles in a deep, dreamless sleep. It was hours before Angel slept that night. She lay awake listening to the thunder in the distance, for the storm was passing away, and watching the lightning as it occasionally illuminated her room, whilst her tender conscience reproached her that she had not told her father of Gerald's disobedience when he had first gone fishing in the clay pits, and Mrs. Mickle had acquainted her with the truth. By holding her peace when she ought to have spoken, she had allowed Gerald to disobey a second time, and thereby nearly brought about the loss of his own and another's precious life. Mrs. Mickle had warned her that she was wrong in shielding her brother from blame; but she had never fully understood till now the harm she had been unconsciously doing. She was greatly troubled at the thought of what her father would say when he returned home and found that his son was not to be trusted. How astonished and grieved he would be when he heard of that evening's work! And, kind and good as Mrs. Mickle had been in sending Dr. Hope to see Gerald that night, how she must blame the boy in her heart.