"Take care, my dear child," said the doctor, pulling him away; "you mustn't frighten black Bob--he won't stand it. But, tell me," he continued, drawing the boy into the hall, "Why did you say the mushrooms had given him a pain in his chest?" "It was the flannel shirt----" began Humphrey; but at the sound of hoofs on the gravel outside, he broke off suddenly: "Oh there's black Bob plunging again; I _must_ go and see--let me go, please." He broke from the doctor's grasp, and ran back to the door, calling out as he did so: "It might have been the flannel shirt, perhaps, if it wasn't the shoes; but we were in such a hurry." Despairing of getting any sense out of him, the doctor let him go, and pursued his way up-stairs, where he had full details from Virginie. He did not think Miles very bad, but ordered him to be kept in two rooms for the rest of the week. I need hardly say that when he came down again Humphrey had persuaded the groom to let him get into the gig, and there he was in the broiling sun without his hat, driving black Bob round and round the approach. CHAPTER V. Little Miles was terribly disappointed to find his confinement up-stairs would extend over the day of the dinner-party, but there was no help for it. The eventful Friday arrived, and Humphrey was on the fidget all day. He paid constant visits to the dining-room and library, and even intruded into the kitchen; but he could see nothing in any of the preparations going on which at all differed from those usual. "I suppose, for once they will eat like civilized people," he told Miles--after visit one hundred and fourth down-stairs, in the vain hope of finding something new. "Yes, just for a treat," suggested little Miles; and they amused themselves for the next few hours by imagining the astonishment of the wild men at all the different things they would see. Sir Everard arrived late, and went straight up to Miles's room. It so happened that he did not see Humphrey, as he was under the hands of Virginie, in preparation for his appearance in company; and as several of the guests had already arrived, Sir Everard had only just time to kiss Miles, and to hurry off to his dressing-room, from whence he descended to the library. So that the conversation of the preceding week, and the children's excitement over the prospect of the aborigines, had entirely escaped his memory, for want of the refreshing it would have been sure to have received had he had time for a word with either of his little boys. He was deep in politics with an old gentleman in a broad expanse of satin waistcoat, and a general buzz of conversation was going on all over the room, when the library door was flung open with a bounce, and Humphrey appeared in the doorway.