Gretel was much interested, and would have liked to ask a number of questions, but at that moment they reached the hotel, and found Higgins eagerly watching for them from the piazza.
Higgins greeted her little charge with a burst of genuine affection. She had grown very fond of Gretel, and her joy and triumph when she discovered that she had been correct in her conviction that the child had not run away voluntarily, was almost as great as Miss Heath’s had been. She took Gretel up-stairs to her room, where she insisted on undressing her at once and putting her to bed.
“You look about ready to drop,” she declared. “To think hof a young lady like you going to bed with ’er clothes on, and running hoff without heven a comb or a tooth-brush, fairly sends chills down my spine.”
Gretel protested that she was not at all tired, but Higgins was firm, and really the warm bath, and soft, comfortable bed were very pleasant.
“A bed is much more comfortable than a berth on a steamboat,” she remarked, with a sigh of content, as she nestled down between the cool, clean sheets. “I wonder if Jerry and Geraldine have gone to bed, too.”
Jerry and Geraldine had gone to bed, but they were not in by any means such good spirits as their friend. The sight of their mother’s white, haggard face and swollen eyes, had been more of a rebuke to the two little sinners than any amount of punishment, and Geraldine’s first action on reaching home was to fling herself on Mrs. Barlow’s neck, with a burst of remorseful tears.
“Oh, Mother dearest, please, please punish us,” she sobbed. “We’d rather be punished than talked to, we really would. We’re so dreadfully sorry, and it was most all my fault, because Jerry never thought of it till I put the idea into his head.”
It was late in the evening when Gretel awoke from a long, refreshing nap, to find the faithful Higgins sewing by her bedside. She was feeling decidedly better, and also very hungry.
“May I have some supper?” was her first question, when Higgins had told her what time it was, and complimented her upon her improved appearance.
Higgins said she would go down-stairs, and order something from the dining-room.