He turned on his heel and ran over to the mill, shutting the door with a resounding slam. In a trice he had snapped the padlock and had come back to the three girls huddled under the tree.
And then a cheerful whistle sounded and down the lane came the one person Rosemary least desired to see at that moment—Doctor Hugh.
"Got through early!" he called, vaulting the fence and striding toward them. "Why, Rosemary! What's wrong?"
Rosemary made a desperate effort to recover her self-control. She managed a shaky smile, but she did not dare try to stand.
"Perhaps you can find out," said Warren grimly. "I found her like this a few minutes ago and Shirley and Sarah looking as though they'd seen a ghost; and not a word will any of 'em say."
Very coolly, very quietly, very firmly, Doctor Hugh lifted Sarah aside and took her place beside Rosemary on the crate. He rested the tips of his fingers for a moment on the slender wrist nearest him. Then—
"What frightened you. Rosemary?" he asked evenly.
The touch of his skilled fingers seemed to slow down her hammering pulse. Rosemary's troubled gaze swept the circle of faces surrounding her, Sarah's and Shirley's expressive of their anxiety lest she be "sick," Warren's baffled and worried, and came back to the steady, understanding dark eyes behind the doctor's glasses. In that moment Hugh became a tower of refuge to her and she suddenly knew what she would do.
"I don't know what made me act like this," she apologized, a little tinge of color creeping into her white face. "I'm sorry, because I am afraid I have made you think it is worse than it is."
She stopped and looked at Sarah who stared at her in a puzzled way.