He panted violently, his teeth chattered. "Oh! David, you frighten us! What can be the matter? Polly, come here! Nell, come and tell us what is the matter with David." The elder girls, and the rest of the children, collected in the porch. Polly, the tallest of all, looked over the heads of the others. She caught sight of David's face, and a sudden pain, a queer sense of fear, and the awakening of a late remorse, filled her breast. "What is it, David?" she asked, with the others; but her voice shook, and was scarcely audible. "She's done it!" said David. "The baby's gone! It's Flower! She was in one of her passions, and she has taken the baby away. I said she wasn't like other girls. Nurse thinks perhaps the baby'll die. What is it?--oh, Polly! what is it!" For Polly had given one short scream, and, pushing David and every one aside, rushed wildly into the house. She did not hear the others calling after her; she heard nothing but a surging as of great waves in her ears, and David's words echoing along the passages and up the stairs "Perhaps the baby will die!" She did not see her father, who held out his arms to detain her. She pushed Alice aside without knowing that she touched her. In a twinkling she was at the nursery door; in a twinkling she was kneeling by the empty cot, and clasping the little frilled pillow on which baby's head used to rest passionately to her lips. "It's true, then!" she gasped, at last. "I know now what David meant; I know now why he warned me. Oh Nursie! Nursie! it's my fault!" "No, no, my darling!" said Nurse; "it's that dreadful young lady. But she'll bring her back. Sure, what else could she do, lovey? She'll bring the little one back, and, by the blessing of the good God, she'll be none the worse for this. Don't take on so, Miss Polly! Don't look like that, dear! Why, your looks fairly scare me." "I'll be better in a minute," said Polly. "This is no time for feelings. I'll be quiet in a minute. Have you got any cold water? There's such a horrid loud noise in my ears." She rushed across the room, poured a quantity of water into a basin, and laved her face and head. "Now I can think," she said. "What did Flower do, Nurse? Tell me everything; tell me in very few words, please, for there isn't a moment--there isn't half a moment--to lose."