Grace uncovered her eyes and looked at the little dog, who had left her lap and was standing beside Tom, his head cocked on one side, listening. At every flash of lightning he glanced up into his master's face, with a look which asked as plainly as words, "Is it all right?" and when Tom answered, "Yes, it's all right, Tim," appeared quite satisfied.
"How sharp he is!" the little girl said, smiling. "I don't suppose you'd part with him for anything, would you?"
"Money wouldn't buy him," Tom replied; "no, not any amount of money."
There was a long pause in the conversation after this, during which the lightning flashed and the thunder roared, and Tom considered Grace's situation very seriously. She seemed to have made no plans, and he saw that she was nearly done up. He wondered if the Sordellos were searching for her; if so, there was every probability that they would find her, and his kind heart swelled with pity as he thought of her terror of Hero and the heartlessness of those who, for the sake of gain, meant to make a public exhibition of her with the lion, against her will.
"What a miserable life you must have had travelling about with that menagerie!" he remarked by and by. "I saw Mr. Dumbell this morning, and spoke to him. I call him a very rough, ill-mannered man." And forthwith he gave her an account of the scene between Mr. Dumbell and Tiny Jim, to which she listened with a pained expression on her pale little countenance.
"Oh, poor Mr. Rumbelow!" she sighed, when he had finished speaking. "He was anxious about me: that was why he was under the van, listening. Both Mr. and Mrs. Rumbelow have always been very, very kind to me, and now, perhaps, I shall never see them again."
"You don't think of going back, Grace?"
"No, no, no! As soon as the rain stops I must go on."
"It is stopping. The storm is passing, but it will soon be night. The evenings are growing very short now."
"Never mind. I'll walk on till I come to a village or town, and sleep on a doorstep. I'll be careful a policeman doesn't find me. In the morning I'll beg a little food. I must do without it till then. I was very hungry at dinner-time, but I found some blackberries and ate them, and—"