CHAPTER 44Miss Silver sat in the train. She was on her way to Colborough. By her side sat Mrs. Pratt, a wan and tearful figure, and opposite them Dicky in a high state of excitement and good spirits.
“You be careful, Dicky—you be very careful,” said Mrs. Pratt. She pressed a damp screwed-up handkerchief first into her right eye and then her left.
Miss Silver intervened.
“Now, Mrs. Pratt, there is no occasion for you to distress yourself.”
“I’m so afraid,” said Mrs. Pratt. “Suppose they was to say that my Dicky was in need of care and attention and they sent him to one of them schools that are more like prisons than anything else——”
“I do not think that you need be under any apprehension, Mrs. Pratt,” said Miss Silver. “Dicky is going to give evidence about the note which he forgot and
