Nellie lay asleep in her bed, her rich brown hair plaited together and thrown back across the pillow.  The long dark fringes of her eyelashes cast a shade upon the transparent colour of her cheek, and the light breath came softly through her parted lips.  But as Mary Goddard looked she saw that there were still tears upon her lovely face and that the pillow was still wet.  She had cried herself to sleep, for Martha had told her that her mother was very ill and would not see her that night; Nellie was accustomed to say her prayers at her mother’s knee every evening before going to bed, she was used to having her mother smooth her pillow and kiss her and put out her light, leaving her with sweet words, to wake her with sweet words on the next morning, and to-night she had missed all this and had been told moreover that her mother was very ill and was acting very strangely.  She had gone to bed and had cried herself to sleep, and the tears were still upon her cheeks.  Shading the light carefully from the child’s eyes, Mary Goddard bent down and kissed her forehead once and then feeling that her sorrow was rising again she turned and passed noiselessly from the room.

But Nellie was dreaming peacefully and knew nothing of her mother’s visit; she slept on not knowing that scarcely a quarter of a mile away her own father, whom she had been taught to think of as dead, was lying at the Hall, wounded and unconscious while half the detectives in the kingdom were looking for him.  Had Nellie known that, her sleep would have been little and her dreams few.

There was little rest at the Hall that night.  When Reynolds had driven John back to the great house he found his way to the kitchen and got his beer, and he became at once a centre of interest, being overwhelmed with questions concerning the events of the evening.  But he was able to say very little except that while waiting before the cottage he had heard strange noises from the park, that Master John had run up the avenue, that Mrs. Goddard had taken Miss Nellie into the house and had then insisted upon being driven towards the Hall, that they had met Master John and the squire and that Mrs. Goddard had been “took wuss.”

Meanwhile John entered the room where Mr. Juxon was watching over Walter Goddard.  John looked pale and nervous; he had not recovered from the unpleasant sensation of being left alone with what he believed to be a dead body, in the struggling moonlight and the howling wind.  He was by no means timid by nature, but young nerves are not so tough as old ones and he had felt exceedingly uncomfortable.  He stood a moment within the room, then glanced at the bed and started with surprise.

“Why—­he is not dead after all!” he exclaimed, and going nearer he looked hard at Goddard’s flushed face.

“No,” said Mr. Juxon, “he is not dead.  He may be dying for all I know.  I have sent for the doctor.”

“Was he much hurt?” asked John, still looking at the sick man.  “He looks to me as though he were in a fever.”