They returned to The Cedars to find Mrs. White considerably worried over their unexplained absence. But when Dorothy explained where she had been and what she had found out Mrs. White readily forgave her. She was as alarmed and distressed as Dorothy over the revelations of young Jack Popella and she agreed with rather significant readiness that at present nothing should be said to the Major concerning this new turn in events.
“Where is Dad?” asked Dorothy, as she turned to go upstairs. Mrs. White looked still further distressed.
“You must not be alarmed, Dorothy dear,” she said. “But your father preferred to stay in bed this morning——”
“In bed!” Dorothy interrupted swiftly. “Then he is ill!”
“He says he is just tired, dear. And, indeed, he has not slept for several nights,” the Major’s sister explained, adding, as Dorothy once more turned to leave the room: “He has been asking for you.”
“Asking for you, asking for you,” hammered in Dorothy’s head as she ran up the stairs to see for herself why it was the Major had “preferred to stay in bed.”
At the top of the stairs she ran into Ned, who caught her arm and held on to it, laughingly.
“Whither away so fast, fair cousin?” he queried. “You should never rush like that so soon after breakfast. Any doctor’s book will tell you as much.”
“Let me go, Ned,” Dorothy pleaded. “Dad is ill.”
“Not ill—just tired,” corrected Ned, the while Dorothy wondered at his denseness. “No wonder,” he added grumblingly. “I would be tired too, in his place. That young brother of yours needs a sound thrashing, Dot.”