"
By the light of the lantern I saw Miss Thorn cast one meaning look at
Miss Trevor.
"What are you going to do about it?" asked Miss Thorn, addressing me.
"Think of that unhappy man, without a bed, without blankets, without even
a tooth-brush."
"He hasn't been wholly off my mind," I answered truthfully. "But there
isn't anything we can do to-night, with that beastly detective to notice
it."
"Then you must go very early to-morrow morning, before the detective gets
up."
I couldn't help smiling at the notion of getting up before a detective.
"I am only too willing," I said.
"It must be by four o'clock," Miss Thorn went on energetically, "and we
must have a guide we can trust. Arrange it with one of Uncle Fenelon's
friends."
"We?" I repeated.
"You certainly don't imagine that I am going to be left behind?" said
Miss Thorn.
I made haste to invite for the expedition one of the Four, who was quite
willing to go; and we got together all the bodily comforts we could think
of and put them in a hamper, the Fraction not forgetting to add a few
bottles from Mr. Cooke's immersed bar.
Long after the camp had gone to bed, I lay on the pine-needles above the
brook, shielded from the wind by a break in the slope, and thought of the
strange happenings of that day. Presently the waning moon climbed
reluctantly from the waters, and the stream became mottled, black and
white, the trees tall blurs.
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