Fay was pale, but tearless, and said not a word. She let Mildred kiss her, and kissed back again, but in a dead silence. She went into the hall with the child, and to the carriage-door, and they kissed each other on the doorstep, and they kissed at the carriage-window; and then the horses trotted away along the gravel drive, and Fay had a last glimpse of the fair head thrust out of the window, and the lilies and roses of a child’s face framed in pale gold hair.
It was a little more than a fortnight before Bell and her charge went back to The Hook. Mildred had sorely missed her playfellow, but had consoled herself with a spade and pail on the beach, and a donkey of venerable aspect, whose chief distinction was his white linen panoply, on the long dusty roads.
Mrs. Fausset was not at home to receive her daughter. She had a superior duty at Chertsey, where people of some social importance were giving a lawn-party. The house seemed empty and silent, and all its brightness and graceful furniture, and flowers in the hall and on the staircase, could not atone for that want of human life.
“Where is Fay?” cried Mildred, taking alarm.
Nobody answered a question which was addressed to everybody.
“Fay, Fay, where are you?” cried the child, and then rushed up-stairs to the schoolroom, light as a lapwing, distracted with that sudden fear. “Fay, Fay!” The treble cry rang through the house.
No one in the schoolroom, nor in Mildred’s bedroom, nor in the little room where Fay had slept, nor in the drawing-rooms, whither Mildred came running, after that futile quest up-stairs.
Bell met her in the hall, with a letter in her hand.
“Your mamma wished to break it to you herself, miss,” said Bell. “Miss Fay has gone.”
“Gone, where?”