Country life -- England -- Fiction; England -- Fiction; Family life -- Fiction; Railroads -- Fiction; Siblings -- Fiction
She never remembered how she got home. But she went on tiptoe to her
room and locked the door. Then she undid the parcel and read that
printed column again, sitting on the edge of her bed, her hands and feet
icy cold and her face burning. When she had read all there was, she drew
a long, uneven breath.
“So now I know,” she said.
What she had read was headed, 'End of the Trial. Verdict. Sentence.'
The name of the man who had been tried was the name of her Father.
The verdict was 'Guilty.' And the sentence was 'Five years' Penal
Servitude.'
“Oh, Daddy,” she whispered, crushing the paper hard, “it's not true--I
don't believe it. You never did it! Never, never, never!”
There was a hammering on the door.
“What is it?” said Bobbie.
“It's me,” said the voice of Phyllis; “tea's ready, and a boy's brought
Peter a guinea-pig. Come along down.”
And Bobbie had to.
Chapter XI. The hound in the red jersey.
Bobbie knew the secret now. A sheet of old newspaper wrapped round a
parcel--just a little chance like that--had given the secret to her. And
she had to go down to tea and pretend that there was nothing the matter.
The pretence was bravely made, but it wasn't very successful.
For when she came in, everyone looked up from tea and saw her
pink-lidded eyes and her pale face with red tear-blotches on it.
“My darling,” cried Mother, jumping up from the tea-tray, “whatever IS
the matter?”
“My head aches, rather,” said Bobbie. And indeed it did.
“Has anything gone wrong?” Mother asked.
“I'm all right, really,” said Bobbie, and she telegraphed to her Mother
from her swollen eyes this brief, imploring message--“NOT before the
others!”
Tea was not a cheerful meal. Peter was so distressed by the obvious fact
that something horrid had happened to Bobbie that he limited his speech
to repeating, “More bread and butter, please,” at startlingly short
intervals. Phyllis stroked her sister's hand under the table to express
sympathy, and knocked her cup over as she did it. Fetching a cloth and
wiping up the spilt milk helped Bobbie a little. But she thought that
tea would never end. Yet at last it did end, as all things do at last,
and when Mother took out the tray, Bobbie followed her.
“She's gone to own up,” said Phyllis to Peter; “I wonder what she's
done.”
“Broken something, I suppose,” said Peter, “but she needn't be so silly
over it. Mother never rows for accidents. Listen! Yes, they're going
upstairs. She's taking Mother up to show her--the water-jug with storks
on it, I expect it is.”
Bobbie, in the kitchen, had caught hold of Mother's hand as she set down
the tea-things.
“What is it?” Mother asked.
But Bobbie only said, “Come upstairs, come up where nobody can hear us.”
When she had got Mother alone in her room she locked the door and then
stood quite still, and quite without words.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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