Chapter 12

The Thursday night passed, and nothing happened, with the Friday morning came two pieces of news.

Item I.

The baker's man declared he had met Rosanna Spearman on the previous afternoon with a thick

veil on, walking towards Frizzin Hall by the footpath way over the moor.

It seemed strange that anybody should be mistaken about Rosanna, whose shoulder marked her

out pretty plainly poor thing.

But mistaken the man must have been, for Rosanna, as you know, had been all the Thursday afternoon,

ill, upstairs in her room.

Item II came through the postman.

Worthy Mr. Candy had said one more of his many unlucky things, when he drove off in the

rain on the birthday night, and told me that a doctor's skin was waterproof.

In spite of his skin, the wet had got through him.

He had caught a chill that night, and was now down with a fever.

The last accounts, brought by the postman, represented him to be light-headed, talking nonsense

as glibly poor man in his delirium as he often talked it in his sober senses.

We were all sorry for the little doctor, but Mr. Franklin appeared to regret his illness,

chiefly, on Miss Rachel's account.

From what he said to my lady, while I was in the room at breakfast time, he appeared to

think that Miss Rachel, if the suspense about the moonstone was not soon said at rest,

might stand in urgent need of the best medical advice at our disposal.

Breakfast had not been over long when a telegram from Mr. Blake, the elder, arrived in answer

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