“Oh, you seem so heartless about it,” gasped Ann, “when you know how Horace loves her!”

Miss Shellington did not notice the smile that crossed his lips as he looked down at her, or the triumph in his eyes when he said: 

“But, Ann, I’ve told you only what you’ve asked of me.  I think you’re rather unkind, Dear.”

“I don’t intend to be,” she moaned, leaning back and closing her eyes.  “Oh! she was with us so long!  What shall I say to Horace?”

“Didn’t you say he was out of town?”

“Yes, for four or five days,” Ann put the wrong meaning to Everett’s deep sigh, and she finished; “but I’m going to send for him.”

“And, pray, what can he do?  The girl is gone, and that ends it.”

“But Horace might ascertain if she had been forced to go.”

Brimbecomb laughed low.

“No one could force her to jump from the window of her bedroom.”

“Everett, Fledra has always said that she hated her father, and that she never wanted to go back to him, because he abused both her and her brother.”

“Yes, so you told me before, and I think I remember telling you that you were making a mistake in trusting in her truthfulness.  It seems her brother told her that he did not wish to return with the squatter; so she left him here with you.  For my part,” Everett pressed closer to her, “I’m glad that she is gone.  The coming of those children completely changed both you and Horace.  You’ll get used to ingratitude before you’ve done much charity work.”

Ann’s intuition increased her disbelief in the man opposite her.

“Everett, will you swear to me that you had nothing to do with her going?”

Brimbecomb swore glibly enough, and supplemented his oath with: 

“I’ve always felt, though, that you should not have them here; and I can’t say that I shouldn’t have taken them away, if I could, Ann.  Don’t you think we could overlook past unpleasantness, and let our arrangements go on as we intended they should?”

Ann rose hastily to her feet.  She was sorely tempted to fall into his arms.  How handsome he looked, how strongly his eyes pleaded with her!  But her vague fears and distrust held her back.  She sank again to the chair.

“No, no—­not just yet, Everett,” she said.  “I’ve loved you dearly; but I can’t understand Fledra’s disappearance.  Oh, I—­I don’t know how to meet Horace!  He loved and trusted her so!” Again she looked at him with indecision.  “Come back to me, Dear,” she whispered, “when it is all over.  I’m so unhappy today!”

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

Floyd raised his head when Ann bent over him.  Agitation and sorrow had so altered her that the change brought him to a half-sitting position.

“Flea’s sick, I bet!” he burst out, without waiting to be addressed.  “Don’t try to fool me, Sister Ann.”

As his suspicion grew within him, his eyes traveled over her face again and again; then he put his feet on the floor and stood up.