"Let me help you to your room; a few hours' rest will make all right again with you, I trust," Mildred said compassionately.
"Don't allow yourself to feel anxious or distressed," she went on, as she assisted her up the stairs. "I am sure uncle will not be hard with you when he learns how free from blame you are; Juliet has been saved, and he seems to have escaped, and will not be likely to try it again."
"Ah, if I could have met and warned him," sighed the governess.
"Surely it is better as it is, since he has got away without," reasoned Mildred: "for might he not have been angry and abusive?"
"True, too true!" she murmured, catching at the balusters to keep from falling; "yes, it is better so; but my brain reels and I cannot think."
Mildred was alarmed. "What can I do for you?" she asked.
"Nothing, nothing, but help me to my bed, thank you, I shall be better when I have slept off this horrible fatigue and weakness. Oh, such a tramp and weary waiting as it was!—out in the cold and darkness on a lonely road," she gasped shudderingly, as she sank down upon her bed. "It seemed as if I should drop down and die before I could get back to the house. And my terror for him! that was the worst of all!"
"I don't think he deserves your love and care for him!" Mildred said, her indignation waxing hot against the worthless villain.
"Perhaps not," she sighed, "but he loved me once, and he was a noble fellow then. And I—ah, he told me I had helped to ruin him!"