Now she turned with lightened steps towards Ringsford. In the fields on every side the ploughs and harrows were at work; occasionally there was the crack of a gun, and in the distance she could see the blue smoke wreathing up into the air and the sportsmen following their dogs. A soft russet tinge like a great brown cobweb lay upon the Forest, and leaves were fluttering hesitatingly to the ground, as if uncertain whether or not it was yet time to quit the branches. These were the tokens that the harvest-time was over, and the fat ricks in the farmyards told that there had been a goodly ingathering.
When she reached the Manor, the young ladies had barely finished breakfast. They had been dancing until daylight shamed the lamps in the marquee, and consequently they were still at their first meal long after the forenoon dinner had been finished at Willowmere.
‘Why did you not tell us about poor Philip last night, Madge?’ was Miss Hadleigh’s salutation, adding, with a shrug of the shoulders which might represent a shudder: ‘It is so dreadful to think of us all enjoying ourselves while our brother was lying at death’s door.’
‘Not so bad as that, unless there has been some great change since the doctor was here,’ said Madge.
‘There will be such scandal about it all over the country,’ exclaimed Caroline.
‘Everybody will know that you were purposely kept in ignorance of the accident.’
‘I am sure I wouldn’t have laughed or danced at all, if I had only known,’ half-sobbed the conscience-stricken Bertha.
‘That is exactly why he insisted you should not be told about it until after your party.’
‘But it wasn’t our party: it was his party; and everybody will think we are such unfeeling creatures,’ was the petulant comment of Caroline, who appeared to be more occupied about what ‘everybody’ would say than about her brother’s injuries.
And everybody did say a great deal, of course—particularly everybody who had not been invited to the festival. The explanation satisfied those who had shared in the night’s merriment and those who had not pretended to be satisfied. So all was well, and the Misses Hadleigh found a doleful interest in receiving the numerous callers and answering their inquiries. They felt a little chagrin at first that Madge should have the privilege of seeing their brother, whilst they were forbidden access to his room for several days. But this was speedily overcome, for none of them had a partiality for a sick-room, and their visitors kept them fully occupied.