Mr. Mathias, like Miss Dawson, spent a good deal of his time and energy in courting the child’s liking. He was at least sufficiently successful for it to come as a complete surprise to her when presently he began to throw out questions about the death of Captain Vandervoort. Their studied casualness did not deceive her for a moment. He learnt nothing: but she was hardly home, and his carriage departed, than she was violently sick. Presumably she had eaten too many cream buns. But, as she lay in bed sipping from a tumbler of water in that mood of fatalism which follows on the heels of vomiting, Emily had a lot to think over, as well as an opportunity of doing so without emotion.