“That child has never been left all this time in the orchard,” she cried, rushing back into the house. “Surely someone has seen to him.”
“Oh! good me!” exclaimed conscience-stricken Polly, “I clean forgot to tell Libbie to let him go, and now it’s past six.”
“Why the poor lad must be half dead,” cried Mrs. Busson, “fly to him Polly, do.”
Polly’s flight was a short one. In the backyard she met Ned.
“No need to trouble about he,” said Ned, “the master let him out I believe before he started. He’s down in the strawberry beds, as you can see for yourself,” added Ned, putting aside some thick growing privet bushes, and pointing in the direction of the kitchen garden.
There sure enough was Andrew, cowering under the shelter of a big fir tree, which grew against the wall in a corner of the strawberry beds.
“He’s mighty ashamed of himself, for he’s doing his best to hide,” laughed Polly, as she ran back to relieve Mrs. Busson’s fears.
“Well, that is a comfort to be sure,” sighed the poor old lady, “and now, mind Polly when the other children come home, don’t say one word about poor Miss Di. The doctor says that there won’t be much change to be looked for till to-morrow, and there’ll be no good done by telling the poor dears the worst till one’s obliged. They needn’t know till to-morrow that we’ve sent for Miss Di’s mamma.”
And so, little guessing the dread shadow that was hanging over the Farm, the picnic party came merrily home; and though, as they entered the house, they lowered their tones lest they should disturb Diana, they never guessed that she was far too ill to heed sounds of any sort.
“What has become of Andrew?” they asked, after their first questions about Di had been answered with suitable vagueness.