ut an elopement that does
not succeed, when the girl comes home again, is just as bad as--I cannot
think how Olive could have managed to meet Captain Hibbert and arrange
all this business, without my finding it out. I feel sure she must have
had the assistance of a third party. I feel certain that all this is
Barnes's doing. I am beginning to hate that woman, with her perpetual
smile, but it won't do to send her away now; we must wait.' And on these
words Mrs. Barton approached the bed.

Shaken with sudden fits of shivering, and her teeth chattering, Olive
lay staring blindly at her mother and sister. Her eyes were expressive
at once of fear and pain.

'And now, my own darling, will you tell me how all this happened?'

'Oh, not now, mother--not now . . . I don't know; I couldn't help it. . . .
You mustn't scold me, I feel too ill to bear it.'

'I am not thinking of scolding you, dearest, and you need not tell me
anything you do not like. . . . I know you were going to run away with
Captain Hibbert, and met with an accident crossing the stile in the
Lawler Wood.'

'Oh, yes, yes; I met that horrid woman, Mrs. Lawler; she knew all about
it, and was waiting for me at the stile. She said lots of dreadful
things to me . . . I don't remember what; that she had more right to
Edward than I--'

'Never mind, dear; don't agitate yourself thinking of what she said.'

'And then, as I tried to pass her, she pushed me and I fell, and hurt my
ankle so badly that I could not get up; and she taunted me, and she said
she could not help me home because we were not on visiting terms. And I
lay in that dreadful wood all night. But I can't speak any more, I feel
too ill; and I never wish to see Edward again. . . . The pain of my ankle
is something terrible.'

Mrs. Barton looked at Alice expressively, and she whispered in her ear:

'This is all Barnes's doing, but we cannot send her away. . . . We must put
a bold face on it, and brave it out.'

Dr. Reed was announced.

'Oh, how do you do, doctor? . . . It is so good of you to come at once.
. . . We were afraid Mr. Barton would not find you at home. I am afraid
that Olive has sprained her foot badly. Last night she went out for a
walk rather late in the evening, and, in endeavouring to cross a stile,
she slipped and hurt herself so badly that she was unable to return
home, and lay exposed for several hours to the heavy night dews. I am
afraid she has caught a severe cold. . . . She