“Will you send for a doctor at once,” she said eagerly, “Bobby is very ill, very ill indeed!” “What is the matter?” enquired the stolid German. “It’s all rubbish!” exclaimed Madame Gobelli, forcing her way past the ex-governess, “’ow can ’e be ill when ’e was running about all the morning? ’Ere, Bobby,” she continued, addressing the prostrate figure of her son which was lying face downward on the bed, “get up at once and don’t let’s ’ave any of your nonsense, or I’ll give you such a taste of my stick as you’ve never ’ad before! Get up, I say, at once now!” She had laid hold of her son’s arm, and was about to drag him down upon the floor, when Miss Wynward interposed with a face of horror. “Leave him alone!” she cried, indignantly. “Woman! cannot you see what is the matter? Your son has left you! He is _dead_!” The Baroness was about to retort that it was a lie and she didn’t believe it, when a sudden trembling overtook her, which she was powerless to resist. Her whole face shook as if every muscle had lost control, and her cumbersome frame followed suit. She did not cry, nor call out, but stood where the news had reached her, immovable, except for that awful shaking, which made her sway from head to foot. The Baron on hearing the intelligence turned round to go downstairs and dispatch William, who was employed in the stables, in search of a medical man. Miss Wynward took the lifeless body in her arms and tenderly turned it over, kissing the pallid face as she did so--when Harriet Brandt, full of mournful curiosity, advanced to have a look at her dead playmate. Her appearance, till then unnoticed, seemed to wake the paralysed energies of the Baroness into life. She pushed the girl from the bed with a violence that sent her reeling against the mantelshelf, whilst she exclaimed furiously, “Out of my sight! Don’t you dare to touch ’im! This is all _your_ doing, you poisonous, wicked creature!” Harriet stared at her hostess in amazement! Had she suddenly gone mad with grief? “What do you mean, Madame?” she cried. “What I say! I ought to ’ave known better than to let you enter an ’ouse of mine! I was a fool not to ’ave left you be’ind me at Heyst, to practise your devilish arts on your army captains and foreign grocers, instead of letting you come within touch of my innocent child!” “You are mad!” cried Harriet. “What have I done? Do you mean to insinuate that Bobby’s death has anything to do with me?” “It is _you_ ’oo ’ave killed ’im,” screamed the Baroness, shaking her stick, “it’s your poisonous breath that ’as sapped ’is! I should ’ave seen it from the beginning. Do you suppose I don’t know your ’istory? Do you think I ’aven’t ’eard all about your parents and their vile doings--that I don’t know that you’re a common bastard, and that your mother was a devilish negress, and your father a murderer? Why didn’t I listen to my friends and forbid you the ’ouse?”