crouched on a sofa in the darkest corner of the room, hiding her
eyes, stopping her ears.

Then a sudden thought brought her bolt upright. Gypsy! Tess had said
Gypsy was afraid of thunder-storms--awfully afraid. And Gypsy was
all alone in that big, gloomy barn--Tess blocks away at the Library.

She tried to hide amongst the cushions again, but visions of Gypsy,
with her bright inquisitive eyes, her funny little petulances, her
endearing cajoleries, kept rising before her. She felt a stab of
remorse; that she could have let even the delights of reading and
improvising compensate for separation from such a darling pony. She
had been selfish, selfcentred. And now Gypsy was alone in that old
barn, trembling and neighing. . .

Finally, unable to endure the picture longer, she crept out to the
hall. She could hear mother and Aunt Nettie in the sitting-room--she
couldn't get an umbrella from the closet. So, without umbrella or
hat, she stole out the front door. Above was a continuous network of
flame as though someone were scratching immense matches all over the
surface of heaven, but doggedly she ran on. The downpour caught her,
but on she sped though rain and hail hammered her head, blinded her
eyes, and drove her drenched garments against her flesh.

She found Gypsy huddled quivering and taut in a corner of the stall.
She put her arms round the satiny neck, and they mutely comforted
each other. It was thus that Tess discovered them; she, too, had run
to Gypsy though it had taken longer as she had farther to go; but
she was not so wet as Missy, having borrowed an umbrella at the
Library.