A confused hum of voices struck upon his ear, a confused group of people swam before his eyes, but he only distinguished a little form that ran forward with outstretched arms; and with an exclamation of fervent thanksgiving he clasped Miles safe, warm, and unhurt in his arms! How eagerly he felt the little pulse and chafed the little hands! He stopped the child's mouth with kisses whenever he attempted to speak. He was so occupied with his newly recovered treasure, that he did not notice what a deep silence had fallen on the assembled group on his entrance; but now he turned to one of the maids, and asked how the accident had happened. "And, by the way," he added, "where is Master Humphrey?" No one answered. "Where is Master Humphrey?" repeated the baronet. "They told me not to say," began little Miles; but his father was looking directly at one of the gardeners, and the man was obliged to answer. "If you please, Sir Everard, we carried Master Duncombe in there," pointing to the drawing-room. "In _there_!" said the baronet, amazed. "If you please, Sir Everard, it was the first room we came to; and the only one where there was a sofa." Before he had done speaking, Sir Everard was in the room. A shutter had been opened, and there was just light enough for him to see Virginie bending over the sofa, round which was a group of people. The doctor came forward from among them, but Sir Everard pushed past him, and advanced to the side of the sofa. And there, under his mother's picture, colorless, motionless, and to all appearance lifeless, lay the boy for whom "no punishment could be severe enough," and whose disobedience he had felt he never could forgive! CHAPTER XIV. No one was to blame. The reapers had run to the pond on hearing the children's cries, and had extricated them immediately; Virginie had sent for the doctor at once. So no one had failed in their duty; or had, as I say, been to blame--except the poor little victim himself. "At present," the doctor informed Sir Everard, "the extent of the injuries could not be determined." Miles, from having been jerked off the end of the branch straight into the water, had escaped with a wetting; but Humphrey, from having been nearer the tree, had come in contact with the trunk, and the bough under the water, and the doctor feared both spine and head had been injured. He asked for further advice, and a man was dispatched with a telegram for two of the greatest surgeons of the day. The calamity was so sudden, so awful, so unexpected! Sir Everard could not realize it--kept on misunderstanding the doctor's incoherence--the poor old doctor who had known him all his life, and could not bear to be the one to tell him that, even if his boy's life were spared, he must ever be a helpless cripple.