“When did this come?”
“On Saturday morning.”
“But this is Wednesday. How is it I did not see it before?”
“To tell you the truth, Henry, I read it and kept it back on purpose. I want to keep your attention until all the family are assembled. Here is your chair, here are your spectacles, and here is the paper.”
Mr. Dale took the paper, muttering to himself:
“Mahaffy—Mahaffy; one of the greatest scholars of the time;” and then he was lost to external things.
Yes, Mr. Dale of The Dales, the head of an ancient house, the father of a large family, forgot everything on earth except a certain disputed passage in which he and Professor Mahaffy diametrically disagreed. He continued to forget everything else, even when nurse rushed into the room.
“Why, she has gone!” cried the good woman. “She ain’t in her bed; and what’s more, she’s been out of it for hours, and the window is open. Oh, whatever has come to the child? Where in the world is she?”
Miss Tredgold looked terribly startled. Verena’s face turned like a sheet. Briar and Patty clasped each other’s hands. Pen said to herself:
“This is the time for a good sort of child like me to do something.”