"I couldn't forbid her to go to college. I couldn't do anything but"—Mrs. Lister now broke down completely—"but watch and pray."
"And you never told me!"
"I couldn't tell any one about Basil. If you had known what a sweet little boy he was, perhaps I could have told you. And Richard—oh, Richard, Richard!"
"I heard Mrs. Scott."
"I went there to look for him."
"To the Bents'!"
"Yes, through all the lanes. It was quite dark and no one saw me. But I fell once; I was so excited and the lane was rough. Miss Bent and her mother were sitting together like innocent people, but he was not there. I said to myself that if he was I would go in and bring him home."
"But, mother, this about Richard is imagination run mad!"
"All the dreadful things I ever imagined came true. When he sits at the piano, he looks like Basil. It's something in them, it—Hark!"