ll on her very soon." And in this mood she went home
to dinner.

CHAPTER VII

DORA BANNISTER TAKES TIME AND A MARE BY THE FORELOCK

Very early that afternoon Miss Dora Bannister was driven to Cobhurst to
call upon the young lady who had been taken sick, and who ought not to be
neglected by the ladies of Thorbury. Dora had asked her stepmother to
accompany her, but as that good lady seldom made calls, and disliked long
drives, and could not see why it was at all necessary for her to go, Dora
went alone.

When the open carriage with its pair of handsome grays had bumped over
the rough entrance to the Cobhurst estate, and had drawn up to the front
of the house, Miss Dora skipped lightly out, and rang the door-bell. She
rang twice, and as no one came, and as the front door was wide open, she
stepped inside to see if she could find any one. She had never been in
that great wide hall before, and she was delighted with it, although it
appeared to be in some disorder. Two boxes and a trunk were still
standing where they had been placed when they were brought from the
station. She looked through the open door of the parlor, but there was no
one there, and then she knocked on the door of a closed room.

No answer came, and she went to the back door of the long hall and looked
out, but not a soul could she see. This was discouraging, but she was not
a girl who would willingly turn back, after having set out on an errand
of mercy. There was a door which seemed to lead to the basement, and on
this she knocked, but to no purpose.

"This is an awfully funny house," she said to herself. "If I could see
any stairs, I might go up a little way and call. Surely there must be
somebody alive somewhere." Then the thought suddenly came into her mind
that perhaps want of life in the particular person she had come to see
might be the reason of this dreadful stillness and desertion, and without
a moment's hesitation she stepped out of the back door into the open air.
She could not stay in that house another second until she knew. Surely
there must be some one on the place who could tell her what had happened.

Approaching the gardener's house, she met Phoebe just coming out
of the door.

"Bless my soul!" exclaimed the woman of color. "Is that you, Miss Dora?
Mike hollered to me that a kirridge had come, and I was a-hurryin' up to
the house to see who it was."

"I came to call on Miss Haverley," said Dora. "How is she, Phoebe, an