“He certainly expected to return, for he did not take his trunk away,” she said, but Mr. Hermann made light of the matter.
“Go home, and don’t worry—he has perhaps been called away by a telegram, and will be back in due time,” he said.
“Indeed, I hope so, sir. He was a very fine young man, and I hope he has come to no harm,” she protested.
And again the wizard laughed:
“How could he come to harm in broad daylight in my house?”
“That’s so, sir; I don’t see how he could indeed, but I hope I shall hear from him soon, for I had bad dreams last night, and my mind misgives me,” she sighed.
Then she asked if she might see the sick girl, but was told she was too ill. Thereupon she went away, sighing, with a very long face, saying to herself:
“If I had told that horrid old man he would not have believed me, but last night I heard spirit voices sobbing in the pine tree outside my window, and whenever I hear that, it’s a sure sign of trouble.”
While she went slowly out of the gate Miss Tuttle was watching her from the window, and she said to the pale girl sitting back among the pillows:
“There goes Mrs. Gray. I suppose she has been to inquire about you.”