warren stood a moment in indecision. rosemary's pallor frightened him and she was evidently concealing something. sarah and shirley glanced at him hostilely as though, he thought resentfully, he was in some way to blame.
he turned on his heel and ran over to the mill, shutting the door with a resounding slam. in a trice he had snapped the padlock and had come back to the three girls huddled under the tree.
and then a cheerful whistle sounded and down the lane came the one person rosemary least desired to see at that moment—doctor hugh.
"got through early!" he called, vaulting the fence and striding toward them. "why, rosemary! what's wrong?"
rosemary made a desperate effort to recover her self-control. she managed a shaky smile, but she did not dare try to stand.
"perhaps you can find out," said warren grimly. "i found her like this a few minutes ago and shirley and sarah looking as though they'd seen a ghost; and not a word will any of 'em say."
very coolly, very quietly, very firmly, doctor hugh lifted sarah aside and took her place beside rosemary on the crate. he rested the tips of his fingers for a moment on the slender wrist nearest him. then—
"what frightened you. rosemary?" he asked evenly.
the touch of his skilled fingers seemed to slow down her hammering pulse. rosemary's troubled gaze swept the circle of faces surrounding her, sarah's and shirley's expressive of their anxiety lest she be "sick," warren's baffled and worried, and came back to the steady, understanding dark eyes behind the doctor's glasses. in that moment hugh became a tower of refuge to her and she suddenly knew what she would do.
"i don't know what made me act like this," she apologized, a little tinge of color creeping into her white face. "i'm sorry, because i am afraid i have made you think it is worse than it is."
she stopped and looked at sarah who stared at her in a puzzled way.
"you won't want me to tell, sarah dear," went on rosemary, still calmly, "but this time i think i'd better; because—well, because if there should be a next time and you should hurt yourself, i should be to blame. besides, there is shirley."
warren drew a deep breath and doctor hugh sent a look toward sarah that made that young person decidedly uncomfortable though she pretended to be absorbed in the antics of a beetle and sat down, cross-legged, to consider it.
"then it was the windmill?" asked warren.
"yes, it was the windmill," nodded rosemary, putting her arm around shirley who was beginning to feel that her adored older sister had for once deserted her.
and then she told them, graphically and in detail, how she had found the two children on the platform and of the climbs she had made to bring them down safely.
"that part wasn't so bad, really it wasn't," she explained earnestly. "though when sarah's foot slipped—"
warren looked at doctor hugh.
"but i keep thinking of that awful platform!" cried rosemary, hiding her face against her brother's shoulder and tightening her arm about shirley. "every time i close my eyes i can see them there—and it is such a narrow space and they could have fallen off so easily—"
"stop!" said doctor hugh sternly. "stop that at once, rosemary. you are letting your imagination run away with you. closing your eyes and thinking what might have happened, will not do at all. you'll get the better of your nerves, if you try. don't think what has happened and, above all, don't talk about it. tag around after warren and rich to-day and keep so busy you haven't time to think—you'll find the worst is over now that you have told us."
rosemary lifted her head. she was quite herself, her blue eyes told warren. under her arm, shirley peeped uncertainly at her brother.
"come around here where i can see you, shirley," he commanded.
she obeyed disconsolately.
"you were there when warren said that you must not go in the windmill, weren't you?" said doctor hugh. "and now you see what happens when you disobey him. i understand that sarah suggested this disobedience, but that doesn't excuse you, shirley; there have been plenty of times when you have refused to do as sarah asked you to. you didn't have to be naughty because she was, did you?"
shirley shook her head.
"i know you're sorry," her brother went on. "then tell warren so—and next time, shirley, have a mind and will of your own when you are asked to do something you know is wrong."
warren accepted shirley's apology gravely and then made a suggestion.
"i'm going over to the mill with the heavy wagon," he said, "and if you want to come along, i'll take you. i'll harness up now and let the team stand till after dinner."
sarah scrambled to her feet with the evident intention of including herself in the invitation.
"run along, rosemary," directed doctor hugh, "and take shirley with you. but i want to talk to you, sarah."
rosemary glanced back as she walked away with warren.
"poor sarah!" she said. "i'm so sorry and i know hugh is going to scold. but oh, warren, i think i did right."
"sure," agreed warren tersely. he had been more shaken by her recital than he cared to admit.
"i couldn't have given sarah away like that, if it hadn't been for shirley," said rosemary, her eyes now on the infinitely dear little figure dancing ahead. "sarah asked me not to tell and i said i wouldn't—and i never have before. once she lost aunt trudy's ring and we all got in an awful mess, but we wouldn't tell. hugh said then it was wrong and not being truly kind to sarah.
"i didn't see it that way—then," confessed rosemary. "but to-day—well, to-day, sarah frightened me so! and i thought that if i kept still and said nothing, next time she might hurt herself or shirley—when she makes up her mind, she can persuade shirley to do anything. and sarah goes a little bit further every time, unless she is stopped."
"if you are fretting about whether you did the right thing or not, forget it," warren advised her seriously. "in the first place, your brother would have had the truth from you in five minutes and in the second place shielding sarah when she is in a fair way to break her neck unless someone interferes, isn't far from wicked, to my way of thinking."
"but she trusts me," urged rosemary. "suppose i have lost her confidence?"
"you haven't," said warren with conviction. "more likely, you've gained her respect."
sarah was never to forget the talk with doctor hugh that morning. he sat down beside her on the grass and gravely and kindly, without raising his voice or threatening punishment, made her see what she had done.
"you were angry at me and you wanted to do something to 'get even,' sarah," he began. "and to satisfy that miserable little desire to get even, you would have let serious injury, perhaps worse, come to shirley and rosemary—shirley who would follow you anywhere and rosemary who loves you so much she would dare anything for you."
ignoring her tears and protests, he spoke to her of the responsibility of an older sister for a younger one and explained the far-reaching consequences of temper and disobedience.
"you have frightened rosemary and you have disappointed me," he said sadly. "we both thought that head-strong and willful and reckless as you are, you would always take care of shirley. how can we ever trust her to you again?"
"i didn't think she would get hurt," wept sarah. "i do take care of her."
"my dear little sister—" doctor hugh took her in his arms and the stolid sarah clung to him crying as though her heart would break. "my dear, dear little sister, it is because i want you to always think first, before you do something wrong, that i am talking to you like this. shirley admires you—when you do the right thing, she will try to imitate you even more readily than when you do wrong. you are constantly setting her an example."
he let her cry a little while and then supplied her with his clean pocket handkerchief. with her flushed face pressed against his coat, sarah listened while he explained gently the old, old lessons and laws that govern us all.
"remember this, sarah," he concluded earnestly, "you may think, when you do wrong, that you will take all the punishment yourself, but you can not; no one can bear the consequences of a misdeed wholly alone. every time you do wrong you hurt someone else, two or three others, perhaps, and usually those who love you most."
sarah was only nine years old, but she understood. doctor hugh had a faculty for making people understand him. he slipped his hand under sarah's chin now and lifted the little brown face till the shamed dark eyes met his.
"am i to trust you again, sarah?" he asked gravely.
the little brown face grew vivid, resolution and love contending for possession of the dark eyes.
"i will be just as good!" promised sarah. "truly i will, hugh."
and they sealed the compact with a kiss.
