Scott's hand pressed his arm reassuringly. "Don't imagine such a thing possible!" he said. "Of course you must stay if she isn't very much better by that time. But now, Billy, tell me--if it isn't an unwelcome question--why doesn't your sister want your mother to come to her?"
Billy gave him one of his shrewd glances. "She's told you that, has she? Well, you know the mater is rather a queer fish, and I doubt very much if she'd come if you asked her."
"My good fellow!" Scott said. "Not if she were dying?"
"I doubt it," said Billy, unmoved. "You see, the mater hasn't much use for Dinah, except as a maid-of-all work. Never has had. It's not altogether her fault. It's just the way she's made."
"Good heavens!" said Scott, and added, as if to himself, "That little fairy thing!"
"She can't help it," said Billy. "She can't get on with the female species. It's like cats, you know,--a sort of jealousy."
"And your father?" questioned Scott, the hard look growing in his eyes.
"Oh, Dad!" said Billy, smiling tolerantly. "He's all right--quite a decent sort. But you wouldn't get him to leave home in the middle of the hunting season. He's one of the Whips."
Scott's hand had tightened unconsciously to a grip. Billy looked at him in surprised interrogation, and was amazed to see a heavy frown drawing the colourless brows. There was a fiery look in the pale eyes also that he had never seen before.
He waited in silence for developments, being of a wary disposition, and in a moment Scott spoke in a voice of such concentrated fury that Billy felt as if a total stranger were confronting him.
"An infernal and blackguardly shame!" he said. "It would serve them right if the little girl never went back to them again. I never heard of such damnable callousness in all my life before."
Billy opened his eyes wide, and after a second or two permitted himself a soft whistle.
Scott's hold upon his arm relaxed. "Yes, I know," he said. "I've no right to say it to you. But when the blood boils, you've got to let off the steam somehow. I suppose you've written to tell them all about her?"
"Oh yes, I wrote, and so did the Colonel. I had a letter from Dad this morning. He said he hoped she was better and that she was being well looked after. That's like Dad, you know. He never realizes a thing unless he's on the spot. I daresay I shouldn't myself," said Billy broadmindedly. "It's want of imagination in the main."