It was darker than it was wont to be at that season of the year. Black, heavy clouds hung low in the heavens. The air was motionless, hot, oppressive. One needed no keen perception to tell that a storm was brewing. As Dorothy gained the river bank, in the distance was the loud muttering of thunder. She stopped to look about her, still keeping well in the shadow of the hedge. Apparently her flight had been unnoticed. It struck her that, if she had liked, she might have gone long ago, and been far away, ere this, without anyone being one penny the wiser; and so have lessened the chance of "the family" being associated with her ill-fame. As she looked back it seemed to her that the house was badly lighted. There was light in one room on the ground floor; with that exception the whole house was in darkness. Surely it was not the Vernon custom to keep the whole house unlighted when the night came on. There were lights in the windows of houses on the other side of the stream, and there were lights on the river. Tinted lights picked out the outlines of houseboats, making them orgies of colour. Dorothy, who had never seen anything of the sort before, stared at them in amaze, wondering what they were. Small craft, moving here and there, carried Chinese lanterns, slung on cords, which swayed mysteriously in the silent air. In the distance were many lights. The regatta was to be followed by what dwellers by the river call a Venetian Fête: there was to be a procession of illuminated boats, which already was forming afar off. If they wished to keep their procession dry they would be wise to start it soon.