"I know what I should say, and what I shall say!" said Nurse; "I shall tell the mistress that if something isn't done to curb Master Tom, he'll be such a plague, that no one will care to see him. I've had such a day with him to-day as I don't intend to have again!"
And Nurse carried Ettie off to the nursery, where she took off her wet clothes, and put her into a warm bed. For Ettie was shivering, though it was a hot day, and Nurse gave out that she thought Master Tom would make his sister quite ill.
Which opinion reached Tom's ears; so he crept upstairs cautiously.
"Nurse, nurse," he said, "is Ettie very bad?"
"She's got a shivering and a shaking, and it may be an inflammation," said Nurse severely, "and what shall you say if, by your mischievous doings, you have hurt your sister!"
Master Tom's soul was filled with terror.
"I don't know how it may end," continued Nurse, "but the best thing you can do is to go downstairs and sit in the dining-room till master and mistress come home. Go away from here."
And Nurse shut the door and bolted it; and Tom, feeling more miserable than he had ever felt in his life, went away, but not to the dining-room.
He went to his own little room, where, with a white face, he watched, till his mother came home. He would tell her everything, and he knew that she would let him just look at Ettie before he went to bed. And he said to himself—
"I will never get into mischief again."