Page:Across the Stream.djvu/50

40 "It sounds as if it was in the hall," said Lady Davidstow. "Harry, will you open the door and see what it is?"

"Yes, I'll go," he said firmly. "But—but shan't Archie come too?"

The noise ceased as suddenly as it had begun, and with a pleasing sense of terror the two boys went to the drawing-room door and opened it.

"But it's quite dark," said Archie. "Oh, mummy, what is happening?"

"I can't think. I only know one person who makes a noise the least like that."

"Oh, is it Abracadabra?" asked Archie excitedly, finding that his scepticism of the day before had vanished like smoke. It had occurred to him that Abracadabra was his mother, but here was his mother telling them stories.

"Well, the only time I ever heard her sneeze it was just like that," said Lady Davidstow.

Archie came running back, shrieking with laughter.

"And what does she do when she blows her nose?" he asked.

The words were hardly out of his mouth when a piercing trumpet-blast sounded, and his mother got up.

"She did it then," she whispered. "What had we better do? Shall we go into the hall? She would like us to be there to meet her, perhaps, if she's coming."

She went to the door, followed by the children, and they all looked out into the black hall. The wood-fire in the hearth there had died down to a mere smoulder of red, which sent its illumination hardly farther than the stone fender-curb.

"But there's something there," said Lady Davidstow in an awe-struck whisper. "There's something sitting in the chair."

"Oh, mummy," said Archie, coming close to her. "I don't think I like it."