“It’s nothing particular,” said Peter, unwinding it slowly from his hand, and humbly giving it up.  “It’s nothing but a little sort of a gold band and an ornament that I found stuck in a tree.”  Then Peter, observing by her silence how high his misdemeanour had been, began to sob a little, and then to make a few excuses, and then to say he hoped his grandmother would forgive him.

No answer.

“I wish I hadn’t done it,” he next said.  He felt that he could not say more than that, and he looked up at her.  She was not regarding him at all, not attending to what he had said, her face was very white, she was clutching the bit of gold lace in her hand, and her wide-open eyes were staring at something above his head.

“Peter!  Peter!  Peter!” she cried again, in a strangely sharp and ringing voice.  It seemed as it she would fall, and Peter caught hold of her arm and held her, while the thought darted through his mind, that perhaps she had called him at first because she was ill, and wanted him to hold her, not because she had observed his visit to the garden.  He felt sure she could hardly stand, and he was very much frightened, but in a moment the nurse, having heard her cry, came running out, and between them they guided her to her chair in the alcove.

“I’m very sorry, grandmother,” Peter sobbed, “and really, really I didn’t take any nests or lilies or anything at all, but only that bit of stuff.  I’ll never do it again.”

As he spoke he saw his mother and aunt coming up with looks of grief and awe, and on looking into his grandmother’s face he beheld, child that he was, a strange shadow passing over it, the shadow of death, and he instinctively knew what it was.

“Can’t you move poor grandmother out of the sun?” he sobbed.  “Oh do!  I know she doesn’t like it to shine in her eyes.”

“Hush! hush!” his mother presently found voice enough to say amid her tears.  “What can it signify?”

After that Peter cried very heartily because everybody else did, but in a little while when his grandmother had been able to drink some cordial, and while they were rubbing her cold hands, she opened her eyes, and then he thought perhaps she was going to get better.  Oh, how earnestly he hoped might be so!

But there was no getting better for Madam Melcombe.  She sat very still for some minutes, and looked like one newly awakened and very much amazed, then, to the great surprise of those about her, she rose without any aid, and stood holding by her high staff, while, with a slightly distraught air, she bowed to them, first one and then another.

“Well, I thank you for all your kindness, my dears,” she said, “all your kindness.  I may as well go to them now; they’ve been waiting for me a long time.  Good Lord!” she exclaimed, lifting up her eyes, “Good Lord! what a meeting it will be!”

Then she sank down into her chair again, and in a moment was gone.