re you doing here, may I ask?" he said, very coldly.

The scarlet colour flooded her cheeks, her very brow, and then
dropped down again, leaving her white to the lips, but she made no
answer.

"You have run away from school, I suppose?" he continued, in the
same unemotional voice. "Have you anything to say?"

Judy did not speak or move, she only watched his face with parted
lips.

"Have you anything to say for yourself, Helen?" he repeated.

"No, Father," she said.

Her face had a worn, strained look that might have touched him
at another time, but he was too angry to notice.

"No excuse or reason at all?"

"No, Father."

He moved toward the opening. "A train goes in an hour and a half, you
will come straight back with me this moment," he said, in an even
voice. "I shall take precautions to have you watched at school since
you cannot be trusted. You will not return home for the Christmas
holidays, and probably not for those of the following June."

It was as bad as a sentence of death. The room swam before the girl's
eyes, there was a singing and rushing in her ears.

"Come at once," the Captain said. Judy gave a little caught breath;
it tickled her throat and she began to cough.

Such terrible coughing, a paroxysm that shook her thin frame and made
her gasp for breath. It lasted two or three minutes, though she put
her handkerchief to her mouth to try to stop it.

She was very pale when it ceased, and he noticed the hollows in her
cheeks for the first time.

"You had better come to the house first," he said, less harshly, "and
see if Esther has any cough stuff."

Then in his turn he caught his breath and grew pale under his bronze.

For the handkerchief that the child had taken from her lips had
scarlet, horrible spots staining its whiteness.

CHAPTER XIV

The Squatter's Invitation

After all there was no dogcart for Judy, no mountain train, no
ignominious return to the midst of her schoolfellows, no vista of
weary months unmarked by holidays.

But instead, a warm, soft bed, and delicate food, and loving voices
and ceaseless attention. For the violent exertion, the scanty food,
and the two nights in the open air had brought the girl to indeed a
perilous pass. One lung was badly inflamed, the doctor said; it was
a mystery to him, he kept telling them, how she had kept up so long;
an ordinary girl would have given in and taken to her bed long ago.
But then he was not acquainted