There was a constant coming and going at The Deanery during the whole of that day, and the very atmosphere seemed full of excitement. Mrs Faucit, however, kept Mildred a prisoner in her own room, gave her an interesting book to read, and forbade the subject of the robbery to be mentioned in her hearing, with the result that by evening she was herself once more, chatting with the girls, and only lapsing into melancholy at the remembrance of poor, unhappy Cécile.
The next morning Mildred saw Lady Sarah for the first time since the eventful moment when she had started on her search for James’s bedroom.
The old lady was sitting in her favourite corner by the drawing-room window, wrapped in shawls, and supported by pillows, for at her advanced age such an experience as she had known was not easily outlived, and as Mildred paced the garden walks with her friends, she received a message to the effect that Lady Sarah wished to see her alone for a few minutes, as she had something particular to say.
“My thanks are due, Most kind and generous maiden, unto you!” quoted Lois, from a play which had been performed at school at the beginning of the Christmas holidays, and Mildred gave a little laugh of complacency.
The quotation sounded appropriately in her ears, for she had no doubt that she was summoned to hear grateful acknowledgment for the help which she had given on the night of the attempted robbery. As she walked across the lawn towards the house, she was rehearsing the scene to herself, after a habit of her own on occasions like the present. “My dear Mildred! How can I thank you sufficiently!” Lady Sarah, she imagined, cried enthusiastically.
“Oh, pray, don’t mention it! I have done nothing at all!”
She screwed her face into the very smile of polite protest with which she would give her answer, and was proceeding to invent an emphatic disclaimer from Lady Sarah, when she came face to face with the Benjamin of the household—little, mischievous Erroll, who was strolling about the garden in search of adventure.
He wore a holland blouse, and absurd little knickerbockers about six inches long, from beneath which his bare legs emerged brown and sturdy.
A scarlet cap was perched on the back of his head, and he swung his arms as he walked with the air of a Grenadier Guard, and a very fierce and warlike one at that. Mildred pinched his ear as she passed, as a mark of affectionate remembrance, whereupon Erroll lifted his funny little face to hers, and volunteered a piece of information.
“I telled Yady Saraw about ze pump!”