“And Hatty is very ill?” asked Bessie, with a sort of desperate calmness that appeared very ominous to Tom, for he answered nervously:
“Well, she is pretty bad. Father says it is a sudden failure. It is her heart; and he says he always expected it. He never did think well of Hatty, only he would not tell us so—what was the use? he said. But now these fainting attacks have made him anxious, for he says one can never tell what may happen; and then he said you must be fetched at once.”
“I suppose we can start by the next train, Tom?”
“Yes, by the 3:15; there is none before that. We must catch the 6:05 from Paddington, so you will have time to look about you.”
“Let me help you,” exclaimed Edna eagerly. “Mamma, will you send Brandon to us?” And she followed Bessie.
Richard came into the room that moment, and took possession of Tom, carrying him off to the garden and stable-yard, and trying to make the time pass in a less irksome manner. Richard could show his sympathy for Bessie in no other way than this, and he felt sorry for Tom, who was feeling awkward among so many strangers, and was trying to repress his feelings, after the fashion of young men.
“I am afraid your sister is very much cut up about this,” observed Richard presently.
“Oh, yes, she will take it uncommonly badly; she and Hatty are such chums.”
“Yes, but I trust that your sister is not dangerously ill?”
“Well, she does not seem so to me,” replied Tom vaguely. “She is weak, of course; any one would be weak after such an attack; but she looks and talks much as usual, only she is too tired to get up.”