Miss Toombs's appearance and conduct at meeting with Mavis was not the only strange behaviour which she displayed. When anyone came into the office, she seemed in a fever of apprehension; also, when anyone spoke to Mavis, her friend would at once approach and speak in such a manner as to send them about their business as soon as possible. Mavis wondered what it could mean. Her boy did not seem quite so well when she got back to Mrs Trivett's for the midday meal. During the afternoon's work, her anxiety was such that she could scarcely concentrate her attention on what she was doing. When she hurried home in the evening, the boy was decidedly worse; there was no gainsaying the seriousness of his symptoms. Every time Mavis tried to make him take nourishment, he would cry out as if it hurt him to swallow. Mrs Trivett, who had had much experience with the ailments of a sister's big family, feared that the baby was sickening for something. Mavis would have sent for a doctor at once, but Mrs Trivett pointed out that doctors could do next to nothing for sick babies beyond ordering them to be kept warm and to have nourishment in the shape of two drops of brandy in water every two hours; also, that if it were necessary to have skilled advice, the doctor had better be sent for when Mavis was at the boot factory; otherwise, he might ask questions bearing on matters which, just now, Mavis would prefer not to make public. Mrs Trivett had much trouble in making the distraught mother appreciate the wisdom of this advice. She only fell in with the woman's views when she reflected, quite without cause, that the doctor's inevitable questioning might, in some remote way, compromise her lover. Late in the evening, when it was dark, Miss Toombs came round to see how matters were going. "It's all your fault, foolish Mavis, for coming to Melkbridge," she remarked, when Mavis had told her of her perplexities. "But how was I to know?" "The only way to have guarded against complications was to keep away altogether. I suppose you wouldn't go even now?" "He's much too ill to move. Besides---" "Will you go when he's better, if I tell you something?" "What?" asked Mavis, seriously alarmed by the deadly earnestness of her friend's manner. "Miss Hunter!" "What of her?" "First tell me, where was it you went for your--your honeymoon?" "Polperro. Why?" "That's one of the places she's been to." "And you think---?" "Her manner's so funny. And you wondered why I was so jolly keen on your not coming to Melkbridge!" "I thought--I hoped my troubles were at an end," murmured Mavis. "Whatever happens, you can rely on me till the death--when it's after dark." "What do you mean?" asked Mavis. "Why, that much, much as I love you, I'm not going to risk the loss of my winter fire, hot-water bottles, and books, for getting mixed up in any scrape pretty Mavis gets herself into."