Part 32 (2/2)

”Well, Elizabeth, I have come to hear your explanations and apologies for your shocking attack on Anna.”

”It was Anna who attacked me,” said Betty. ”It was only when she called me a pry and a spy that I--that I--”

”Hurled all sorts of wicked accusations at her. Oh, I heard you.

You said the most shocking and untrue things in your pa.s.sion.”

”I didn't say a word that wasn't true,” said Betty firmly, ”and--and Anna knows it. Anna could have cleared Kitty, but she wouldn't, and I am not going to let Kitty bear the blame for her and Lettice any longer; and if they won't clear her, I will. Anna called me a sneak, and I said she was mean and bad, and I meant it; and so she is, to let Kitty go on bearing the blame and the disgrace all her life because she is too honourable to tell how mean they are.”

”Did you say that Anna knew who went to Lettice with that letter that night, and that--it wasn't Kafcherine?” asked Aunt Pike, but so quietly and strangely that Betty was really quite frightened by her curious voice and manner.

”Oh, I wish I had not told,” was the thought that rushed through her mind, while her cheeks grew hot with nervousness. But it was too late now to draw back; she must stick to her guns. ”Yes,” she said, but with evident reluctance. ”Ask Anna, please. I--I mustn't say any more.

Father wouldn't like--”

”Was it--Anna--herself?” asked Mrs. Pike, still in that strange low voice, only it sounded stranger and farther away this time.

”Oh, I can't tell you! I can't tell you!” cried Betty, shrinking now from telling the dreadful truth.

”There--is--no--need to,” gasped Aunt Pike; but she spoke so low that Betty hardly heard the words, and the next moment the poor, shocked, stricken mother had slipped from her chair to the ground unconscious.

Betty saw her fall, and flew from the room screaming for help. Help was not long in coming. Dr. Yearsley ran from the study and the servants from the kitchen, and very soon they had raised her and laid her on the couch. But none of the restoratives they applied were of any avail, and presently they carried her upstairs and laid her on her bed.

But before that had happened, Betty, terrified almost out of her senses by the result of her indiscretion, had flown--flown out of the room and out of the house.

”Oh, what have I done! what have I done!” she moaned. ”Father didn't want her to know, and Kitty didn't want her to, and now I have told her and it has killed her. I am sure I have killed her. And father is away, and Kitty--oh, what can I do? I can never go home any more.

P'r'aps if I'm lost they'll be sorry and will forgive me,” and Betty ran on, nearly frantic with fear, and weeping at the pathetic picture of her own disappearance.

The next morning Kitty, on her way from the music-room, where she had been practising before breakfast, saw the morning's letters lying on the hall table, and amongst them one directed to herself in Betty's hand.

Without waiting to have it given to her in the usual way, she picked it up, and, little dreaming of the news it held, opened it at once.

”Dear Kitty,” she read, ”I have run away for ever, and I am never going home any more. I think I have killed Aunt Pike. I told her something, and she fell right down on the floor. She was dead, I am sure, and I ran away. I am too frightened to go home, so do not ask me to. I am going to earn my living. I am hiding at the farm. Mrs. Henderson thinks I am going home soon, but I am not; and if she won't let me sleep here, I shall sleep in the woods. To-morrow I shall try to get a place as a servant or something. I wish I looked older, and that I had one of your long skirts. I can put my hair up, but my dress is so short.

Good-bye for ever.--

”Your loving Betty.”

”S.P.--Give my love to father if he will except it from me, and tell him I did not mean to be a bad child to him.”

Kitty stood staring blankly at the letter, scarcely able to grasp its meaning. It seemed too wild, too improbable to be true. Betty had run away; was frightened, desperate, too frightened to go home; had been out all night alone; and they were all far away from her, all but Tony.

Kitty felt stunned by the unexpectedness and greatness of the trouble, but she realized that she must act, and act quickly.

Miss Pidsley and Miss Hammond were gone to an early service at the church, but it never occurred to Kitty to wait for them and consult them. She only realized that a train left for Gorlay in twenty minutes'

time, and that if she could catch it she could be at home in little more than two hours, and on the spot to seek for Betty. She cleared the stairs two at a time, and in less than three minutes was flying down them again and out of the house, b.u.t.toning her coat as she went, and had vanished round the corner and down the road. She felt absolutely no fear of meeting her teachers, for it never entered her head that she was doing anything wrong. Miss Pidsley had once said that if she was wanted at home she could go, and Kitty had never, since then, felt herself a prisoner at school. She did hope that she might not meet them, or any one else she knew, for time was very precious, and explanations would cause delay; but that they might forbid her to go never once entered her head. Her mind was full of but one thought--Betty was lost, and no one but herself had any clue as to her whereabouts.

But the only person that Kitty met was a telegraph boy. Miss Pidsley and Miss Hammond, coming home by another route, met the telegraph boy too at the gate, and took the telegram from him.

”Oh,” exclaimed Miss Pidsley as she opened it and mastered its contents, ”dear, dear! This brings bad news for Katherine Trenire. Listen,” and she read aloud, ”Mrs. Pike seriously ill. Send Miss Trenire at once.

Yearsley.”

”Shall I break it to the poor child?” asked Miss Hammond anxiously.

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