The great square Abbey pew at the top of the church was empty throughout Easter Sunday. A heavy gloom reigned at the Vicarage. Avery and the children were in dire disgrace, and Mrs. Lorimer spent most of the day in tears. She could not agree with the Vicar that they were directly responsible for the Squire's death. Dr. Tudor had been very emphatic in assuring them that what had happened had been the inevitable outcome of a disease of long standing. But this assurance did not in any way modify the Vicar's attitude, and he decided that the five children should spend their time in solitary confinement until after the day fixed for the funeral. This was to be Easter Tuesday, and he himself had arranged to depart the day after--an event to which the entire household, with the single exception of Olive, looked forward with the greatest eagerness. No message came from Piers that night, and Avery wondered a little, but without uneasiness. He must have so very much to think of and do at such a time, she reflected. He would scarcely even have begun to feel the dreadful loneliness. But when the next day passed, and still no answer came, a vague anxiety awoke within her. Surely her message had reached him! Surely he must have read it! The Piers she knew would have dashed off some species of reply at once. How was it he delayed? The day of the funeral came, and the Easter flowers were all taken away. The Vicarage blinds were drawn, the bell tolled again, and Jeanie, weighed down with a dreadful sense of wickedness, lay face downwards on the schoolroom sofa and wept and wept. Avery was very anxious about her. The disgrace and punishment of the past few days had told upon her. She was sick with trouble and depression, and Avery could find no means of comforting her. She had meant herself to slip out and to go to the funeral for Piers' sake, but she felt she could not leave the child. So she sat with her in the darkened room, listening to her broken sobbing, aware that in the solitude of her room Gracie was crying too, and longing passionately to gather together all five of the luckless offenders and deliver them from their land of bondage. But there was to be no deliverance that day, nor any lightening of the burden. The funeral over, the Vicar returned and sent for each child separately to the study for prayer and admonition. Jeanie was the last to face this ordeal and before it was half over Avery was sent for also to find her lying on the study sofa in a dead faint. Avery's indignation was intense, but she could not give it vent. Even the Vicar was a little anxious, and when Avery's efforts succeeded at length in restoring her, he reprimanded Jeanie severely and reduced her once more to tears of uncontrollable distress.