And now I must go and tell the policeman. Don't you tell
father where I've gone if he wakes up, or he'll run away before the
policeman comes."
"Why?"
"So as not to go to hell," said the boy, with certainty; and they
went downstairs together, the little mind of the girl being much
perturbed because she was so wicked. What would mother say tomorrow
if she had done wrong?
The boy put on his sailor hat in the hall. "You must go in there and
watch," he said, nodding in the direction of the sitting-room. "I
shall run all the way."
The door banged, and she heard his steps down the path, and then
everything was quiet.
She tiptoed into the room, and sat down on the floor, and looked at
the back of the chair in utter distress. She could see her father's
elbow projecting on one side, but nothing more. For an instant
she hoped that he wasn't there--hoped that he had gone--but then,
terrified, she knew that this was a piece of extreme wickedness.
So she lay on the rough carpet, sobbing hopelessly, and seeing real
and vicious devils of her brother's imagining in all the corners of
the room.
Presently, in her misery, she remembered a packet of acid-drops that
lay in her pocket, and drew them forth in a sticky mass, which parted
from its paper with regret. So she choked and sucked her sweets at
the same time, and found them salt and tasteless.
Ray was gone a long time, and she was a wicked girl who would go to
hell if she didn't do what he told her.
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