"Nothing can be done now," concluded Mrs. Gass. "There's just one chance for you--that the rumour may die away. If it will, let it; and take warning to be more cautious in future. The probability is that Mother Green and Tim Wilks have mentioned it to others besides me and Packerton's wife: if so, nothing will keep it under. You have been a great fool, Jelly."
Jelly went away in terrible fright. Mrs. Gass had laid the matter before her in its true light. Suspect as she might, she had no proof; and if questioned by authority could not have advanced one.
"Dr. Rane have been in here three times after you," was young Riah's salutation when Jelly reached home.
"Dr. Rane has?"
"And he said the last time you oughtn't to be away from the house so long with only me in it," added the damsel, who felt aggrieved, on her own score, at having been left.
"Oh, did he!" carelessly returned Jelly.
But she began considering what Dr. Rane could want. For her parting charge to Riah, that Dr. Rane was coming in, had been a slight invention of her own, meant to keep that young person up to her duty. Just as she had decided that it might refer to this same report, which he might have heard, and Jelly was growing more and more ill at ease in consequence, he came in. She went to him in the dining-room.
"Jelly," said the doctor, "I think I have let the house."
"Have you, sir?" returned Jelly, blithely, in the agreeable revulsion of feeling. "I'm sure I am glad."
"But only for a short time," continued Dr. Rane. "Two ladies of Whitborough are wanting temporary change of air, and will take it if it suits them. They are coming tomorrow to look at it."