Billy was bored as well as anxious, and his attitude said as much as he unceremoniously left his small playfellows to join Scott.

“Just amusin’ the kids,” he observed explanatorily.  “How is she now?”

Scott linked his hand in the boy’s arm.  “She’s pretty bad, Billy,” he said.  “Both lungs are affected.  The doctor thinks badly of her, though he still hopes he may pull her through.”

“You may you mean,” returned Billy.  “Can’t say the de Vignes have put themselves out at all over her.  There’s Rose flirts all day long with your brother, and Lady Grace grumbling continually about the folly of undertaking other people’s responsibilities.  She swears she must get back at the end of next week for their precious house-party.  And the Colonel fumes and says the same.  I told him I shouldn’t go unless she was out of danger, though goodness knows, sir, I don’t want to sponge on you.”

Scott’s hand pressed his arm reassuringly.  “Don’t imagine such a thing possible!” he said.  “Of course you must stay if she isn’t very much better by that time.  But now, Billy, tell me—­if it isn’t an unwelcome question—­why doesn’t your sister want your mother to come to her?”

Billy gave him one of his shrewd glances.  “She’s told you that, has she?  Well, you know the mater is rather a queer fish, and I doubt very much if she’d come if you asked her.”

“My good fellow!” Scott said.  “Not if she were dying?”

“I doubt it,” said Billy, unmoved.  “You see, the mater hasn’t much use for Dinah, except as a maid-of-all work.  Never has had.  It’s not altogether her fault.  It’s just the way she’s made.”

“Good heavens!” said Scott, and added, as if to himself, “That little fairy thing!”

“She can’t help it,” said Billy.  “She can’t get on with the female species.  It’s like cats, you know,—­a sort of jealousy.”

“And your father?” questioned Scott, the hard look growing in his eyes.

“Oh, Dad!” said Billy, smiling tolerantly.  “He’s all right—­quite a decent sort.  But you wouldn’t get him to leave home in the middle of the hunting season.  He’s one of the Whips.”

Scott’s hand had tightened unconsciously to a grip.  Billy looked at him in surprised interrogation, and was amazed to see a heavy frown drawing the colourless brows.  There was a fiery look in the pale eyes also that he had never seen before.

He waited in silence for developments, being of a wary disposition, and in a moment Scott spoke in a voice of such concentrated fury that Billy felt as if a total stranger were confronting him.

“An infernal and blackguardly shame!” he said.  “It would serve them right if the little girl never went back to them again.  I never heard of such damnable callousness in all my life before.”

Billy opened his eyes wide, and after a second or two permitted himself a soft whistle.

Scott’s hold upon his arm relaxed.  “Yes, I know,” he said.  “I’ve no right to say it to you.  But when the blood boils, you’ve got to let off the steam somehow.  I suppose you’ve written to tell them all about her?”