Juliet sunk back in her seat. The ponies went at full speed along the road. The danger was small, for the park was upon both sides, level with the drive, in which there was a slight ascent. Helen was perfectly quiet, and went on gradually tightening her pull upon the reins. Before they reached the house, she had entirely regained her command of them. When she drew up to the door, they stood quite steady, but panting as if their little sides would fly asunder. By this time Helen was red as a rose; her eyes were flashing, and a smile was playing about her mouth; but Juliet was like a lily on which the rain has been falling all night: her very lips were bloodless. When Helen turned and saw her, she was far more frightened than the ponies could make her. "Why, Juliet, my dear!" she said, "I had no thought you were so terrified! What would your husband say to me for frightening you so! But you are safe now." A servant came to take the ponies. Helen got out first, and gave her hand to Juliet. "Don't think me a coward, Helen," she said. "It was the thunder. I never could bear thunder." "I should be far more of a coward than you are, Juliet," answered Helen, "if I believed, or even feared, that just a false step of little Zephyr there, or one plunge more from Zoe, might wipe out the world, and I should never more see the face of my husband." She spoke eagerly, lovingly, believingly. Juliet shivered, stopped, and laid hold of the baluster rail. Things had been too much for her that day. She looked so ill that Helen was again alarmed, but she soon came to herself a little, and they went on to Mrs. Bevis's room. She received them most kindly, made Mrs. Faber lie on the sofa, covered her over, for she was still trembling, and got her a glass of wine. But she could not drink it, and lay sobbing in vain endeavor to control herself. Meantime the clouds gathered thicker and thicker: the thunder-peal that frightened the ponies had been but the herald of the storm, and now it came on in earnest. The rain rushed suddenly on the earth, and as soon as she heard it, Juliet ceased to sob. At every flash, however, although she lay with her eyes shut, and her face pressed into the pillow, she shivered and moaned.--"Why should one," thought Helen, "who is merely and only the child of Nature, find herself so little at home with her?" Presently Mr. Bevis came running in from the stable, drenched in crossing to the house. As he passed to his room, he opened the door of his wife's, and looked in. "I am glad to see you safely housed, ladies," he said. "You must make up your minds to stay where you are. It will not clear before the moon rises, and that will be about midnight. I will send John to tell your husbands that you are not cowering under a hedge, and will not be home to-night."