Dawn came slowly, and broadened into perfect day, and in the Brinkley house the household stirred and went about accustomed tasks. Soon granny's voice went snarling through the open door, calling shrilly downstairs:
"Liane! Liane!"
Lizzie White answered back from the kitchen:
"She is not here!"
Then granny tapped on Miss Nutter's door.
"Is that lazy baggage in here?"
"I have not seen her since last night," answered Sophie, and presently the house rang with granny's cries of anger and distress.
All went in haste to her rooms, and she reported that Liane had certainly run away, as she had many times threatened to do. All her clothes and little trinkets, together with her little hand bag, were missing.
Granny's blended anger and grief were so superbly acted that her simple listeners did not doubt her truth.
Mrs. Brinkley, thinking of the fine presents Liane had received from some unknown admirer, secretly doubted the story the girl had told her, and confided to Lizzie her belief that she had indeed eloped, and would most likely come to a bad end.