"Then there is something wrong! I am coming down."
And the next moment we could hear her, for she had never undressed, descending the stairway.
"What shall we do—quick—what shall we say?"
Bob Kingsman was never very quick at invention.
"Tell her 'an accident,'" I whispered, "we are going to look for him—say nothing about the yard door having been opened and shut again."
For even then I felt that the key of the mystery lay there.
My mother took it more quietly than we had hoped. She did not cry out, but to this day I mind the tremulous light of the candle which she carried in one shaking hand and sheltered with the other. It went quavering from her breast to her face, and then down again till it mixed with the steady shine of the stable lantern in Bob's hand.
She went into the stable and looked Dapple over carefully, without, however, attempting to touch anything about the mare's trappings.
"There will hae been an accident," she faltered, her tongue almost refusing its office, "your faither must have been thrown! We will all go and seek for him. We will waken the village."
"But you are not fit, mother. Bide here quiet in the house—let others seek—you are never fit."