But there came no answer as day succeeded day, and March blustered itself away, and sweet fickle April took its place; all was silence, as if the lad had indeed vanished from the earth. Had he?
Inna went daily for lessons to the Owl's Nest. It was well to get away from the house, Mrs. Grant said, for the child moped and grew pale under the suspense and mystery of what had befallen this strong, wilful, good-natured cousin of hers, whom she had been gathering to her as the brother she had long sighed for. True, Jenny came over to see her, for she too was lonely, with Dick gone back to school; but what could Jenny understand about her heartache?--she with her brother safe at school, while Oscar, Inna's all but brother, was nobody knew where.
"I wish he hadn't played truant that day, and I wish I hadn't let him:" this was the burdened little plaint, making her heart so heavy, and which she ventured to pour out to Mr. Barlow one day.
"Oh, my dear little lady, don't think that what happened came of his playing truant. I know it isn't a pleasant thought that there was that little hitch of underhand doings; and if he'd only mentioned the going to the Tor, we could have told you all snow was coming, thanks to the glass. But, mind me, we don't get our deserts in that way, or we should be always having a whipping. And I never give up hope with a patient till the last remedy has been tried and fails; and, remember, there is no last remedy with a wise unfailing Providence." This was the surgeon's reply.
"Oh, yes. But suppose he is dead, was killed, washed under the Tor by the dark waters of the brook at the Ugly Leap," sighed the child.
"Oh, well," was the answer, "we can suppose almost anything--at least, a little imaginative girl can; but suppose he is dead--which I do not--dead or alive, he is in God's good keeping," was the reply.
AT THE OWL'S NEST--THE SONG--THE SURPRISE.
Inna now had two new thoughts to ponder over. "Remember, there is no last remedy with a wise unfailing Providence;" "Oscar in God's good keeping." They came to her with thrilling freshness one day in the gallery at Owl's Nest, as she wandered from picture to picture, musing and dreaming.
She was often at the Owl's Nest. Besides going to and fro to lessons, Madame Giche invited her to stay there for days together; it was good for her little nieces to have a child companion, and it was good for the little girl herself, for, as has been said, she moped and grew pale over Oscar's disappearance. So, although they missed her at the farm, they were glad to send her there. Jenny Gregory was invited also: quite a bevy of young people did the four make, wandering through the old house, not intruding upon its aged mistress, save at stated times and seasons, but making a pleasant holiday of it; notwithstanding lessons with Miss Gordon again, and the strumming through of many scales and exercises on the piano. They never tired of roaming the terraces, where the peacocks eyed them askance, and spread out their beautiful tails at them as in proud disdain--those walking flowers of girls, who seemed to vie with them and their plumage in their pretty bright spring dresses.