And Carl lay down, and composed himself for another nap.
But Mrs. Tom was resolved not to be disobeyed; so, dropping the pacific tone she had first adopted, she very summarily snatched away sheets and quilts, pulled the mattress from under him, and overset poor Carl on the floor, from which she soon made him spring up with a sound box on the ear.
"Now then," said the indignant old lady; "tell me ag'in you won't, will ye? Now, look here, ef you ain't dressed and down stairs in five minutes, I'll come back, and this ain't no circumstance to what you'll get. Tell me you won't, indeed! There's no tellin' what the impidence of these scape-goats of boys 'ill come to, ef they ain't minded in time," muttered the old lady to herself, as she descended the ladder.
Carl's toilet, thus unpleasantly hastened, was soon complete, and he descended to the lower room with a very sulky face, and grumbling inwardly at his hard fate in being governed by so tyrannical a task-mistress:
"I don't see why the old feller couldn't have died somewhere else," inwardly muttered the ill-treated Mr. Henley; "a coming here and giving bother, keeping a feller from his sleep of nights. It's downright mean!"
Taking possession of Mrs. Tom's rocking-chair, while the old lady bustled about, laying out the corpse as best she could under the circumstances, Carl was once more soon sound asleep. Then, when all she could do was done, Mrs. Tom lay down on the hard wooden sofa, or "settee," as she called it, and, in spite of the presence of death, followed her worthy nephew to the land of dreams.
Morning was far advanced before either awoke. Mrs. Tom's first care was to send Carl up to the lodge to inform its inmates of the death of her guest, and desire Captain Campbell's immediate presence.
Immediately after breakfast the young captain hastened to the cottage, while Sibyl and Drummond went out for a stroll round the island.
Mrs. Tom had been anxiously revolving in her mind the singular story told her the night before, and resolved to reveal it to Captain Campbell and learn his opinion about it.
Accordingly, when he entered, Mrs. Tom—having first taken the precaution of turning Carl out of doors—related the story in substance as it had been told to her.