The boys stole away on tiptoe, Will saying, huskily: "We can't disturb them now. Let's go and look at the broken dam." Josh stopped short to peer into his companion's face. "Can you stand it, Will?" he said. The boy was silent for a few moments, and then, after making an effort to clear his voice-- "Yes," he said, but very huskily. "Everybody has been saved, and I am going to try and bear it like--well, like a man." "Hooray!" cried Josh, softly. "But I say, what can have become of old Manners?" And then, with a hearty laugh, "I say! Oh, just look there!" He pointed in the direction of a verdant shelf overlooking the clean-swept vale; and there, beneath his white umbrella, sat the object of their search, calmly smoking his big black briar pipe, contemplating the ruins of the dam and a small pile of stones, the only vestige of the vanished mill. "Why, here you are," cried Josh. "Ah, boys," he said, sadly. "But you, Will, ought not you to be in bed?" "Bed?" cried the boy, scornfully. "What for? Josh lent me a suit of his clothes, and I'm quite dry now." "Oh, yes," said Manners; "so am I, but I feel as if I could make a handkerchief precious wet by blubbering like a great, weak girl." "Oh, don't worry about it," cried Will. "Think how we've all been saved. Father's in the best of heart, and he says as soon as he's well that he'll set to and build the whole place up bigger and better than it was before." "Yes," said Josh, "I heard him; and he said, too, that he could do it with a better heart in his thankfulness that not a life was lost." "Ah, yes," said Manners, sadly, "that's quite right, boys; but when you came I wasn't thinking about that, but about my own loss." "Oh," said Will. "You mean about the place being so spoiled?" "No, I don't," said the artist, gruffly. "I was thinking about my pictures--twelve canvases, a whole year's work, washed right away, dead, as it were, and buried under some heap of stones. Ah, boys, they were only so much painted cloth, and I'm afraid they were very bad, but it was all so much work that was somehow very dear to me, and--bah! Never say die! I'll begin again like your father, and build up something fresh." For some days Will paced about the devastated scene, looking white and strange--like one who had a burden on his mind. The Vicar noticed it, and spoke to the doctor when he came to see his patient. "Oh, yes," said the doctor; "I saw it at once. Shock, my dear sir-- shock! The poor boy has a deal to bear, but a young, elastic, healthy chap like that will soon come round." Josh mentioned it, too, in confidence to his father, saying-- "I don't like poor Will's looks. He's so white and strange." But, on hearing the doctor's words, he said-- "Well, he ought to know. We must wait."