To this question no answer was given, but each seemed waiting for the
other to speak. At length a little thing of about twelve came up, and
encircling the new-comer's waist with her arm, looked up with a
sorrowful expression, and whispered,

"Edith dearest, Miss Plympton wants to see you."

The silence and ominous looks of the others, and the whispered words of
the little girl, together with her mournful face, increased the surprise
and anxiety of Edith. She looked with a strange air of apprehension
over the company.

"What is it?" she asked, hurriedly. "Something has happened. Do any of
you know? What is it?"

She spoke breathlessly, and her eyes once more wandered with anxious
inquiry over all of them. But no one spoke, for, whatever it was, they
felt the news to be serious--something, in fact, which could not well be
communicated by themselves. Once more Edith repeated her question, and
finding that no answer was forth-coming, her impatience allowed her to
wait no longer; and so, gathering up her long skirts in one hand and
holding her whip in the other, she hurried into the house to see Miss
Plympton.

Miss Plympton's room was on the second floor, and that lady herself was
seated by the window as Edith entered. In the young girl's face there
was now a deeper anxiety, and seating herself near the centre-table, she
looked inquiringly at Miss Plympton.