Mrs. Guy came a step nearer to the effaced Miss
Bradshaw. "Do you mean she may have stolen them?"
"No. But she had been an actress."
"Oh well then," cried Mrs. Guy, "wouldn't that be just
how?"
"Yes, except that she wasn't at all a brilliant one, nor in
receipt of large pay." The girl even threw off a nervous
joke. "I'm afraid she couldn't have been our Rowena."
Mrs. Guy took it up. "Was she very ugly?"
"No. She may very well, when young, have looked rather
nice."
"Well then!" was Mrs. Guy's sharp comment and fresh
triumph.
"You mean it was a present? That's just what he so
dislikes the idea of her having received--a present from
an admirer capable of going such lengths."
"Because she wouldn't have taken it for nothing? _
Speriamo--that she wasn't a brute. The 'length' her
admirer went was the length of a whole row. Let us hope
she was just a little kind!"
"Well," Charlotte went on, "that she was 'kind' might
seem to be shown by the fact that neither her husband,
nor his son, nor I, his niece, knew or dreamed of her
possessing anything so precious; by her having kept
20
HYLAND
