Mr. Reste’s chamber door stood open; Katrine halted at it and looked in. Why! he seemed to have taken nothing with him! His coats were hanging up; trifles belonging to him lay about on chairs; on the side shelf stood his little portable desk—and she had heard him say that he never travelled without that desk, it went with him wherever he went. Opening a drawer or two, she saw his linen, his neckties, his handkerchiefs. What was the meaning of it all? Could he have been recalled to London in some desperate hurry? But no letter or summons of any kind had come to Caramel Cottage, so far as she knew, except the letter from Captain Amphlett on Tuesday morning, and that one had not recalled him.
“There be two pairs of his boots in the kitchen,” said Joan. “He has took none with him but them he’s got on.”
“I must ask papa about it,” cried the puzzled Katrine.
Mr. Barbary was at the bottom of the garden working away at the celery bed in his shirt sleeves; his coat lay across the cucumber-frame.
“What brings you home now?” he cried out, looking up as Katrine drew near.
“The little girl is not well. Papa,” she added, her voice taking a timid, shrinking tone, she hardly knew why, “Joan says Mr. Reste is gone.”
“Well?”
“But why has he left so suddenly, without saying anything about it?”
“He could do so if he pleased. He was at liberty to go or stay.”