Mr. Moubray was more anxious still, for it seemed to him that he knew very well what she would do. He walked about all the neighbouring roads, and peeped into the cottages, and frightened the Miss Dempsters by going up to their door, with heavy feet crushing the gravel at that unaccustomed hour, for no reason but just to ask how the old lady was!
“I must be worse than I think or the minister would never have come all this way once-errand to inquire about me,” Miss Dempster said.
“He would just see the light, and he would mind that he had made no inquiries for three days,” said Miss Beenie; but she too was uncomfortable, and felt that there was more in this nocturnal visitation than met the eye.
It did not surprise Mr. Moubray that in all his searches he could find no trace of his little girl. He thought he knew where he would find her--on the platform of the little railway station, ready to get into the train for London. And in the meantime his mind was full of thoughts how to serve her best. He was not like the majority of people who are ready enough to serve others according to what they themselves think best. Uncle John, on the contrary, studied tenderly how he could help Effie in the way she wished.
He paused at the post-office, and sent off a telegram to Fred Dirom, expressed as follows:--“You will receive to-morrow morning a letter from Gilston. E. wishes you to know that it does not express her feeling, that she stands fast whatever may happen.”
When he had sent this he felt a certain tranquillising influence, as if he had propitiated fate, and said to himself that when she heard what he had done, she might perhaps be persuaded to come back. Then the minister went home, put a few things into his old travelling bag, and told his housekeeper that he was going to meet a friend at the train, and that perhaps he might not return that night, or for two or three nights. When he had done this, he made his evening prayer, in which you may be sure his little Effie occupied the first place, and then set off the long half-hour’s walk to the station.
By this time it was late, and the train was due: but neither on the platform, nor in the office, nor among those who stood on the alert to jump into the train, could he find her. He was at last constrained to believe that she was not there. Had she gone further to escape pursuit, to the next station, where there would be nobody to stop her? He upbraided himself deeply for letting the train go without him, after he had watched it plunging away in the darkness, into the echoes of the night. It seemed to thunder along through the great silence of the country, waking a hundred reverberations as he stood there with his bag in his hand, aghast, not knowing what to do. There had been time enough for that poor little pilgrim to push her way to the next stopping place, where she could get in unobserved.