hink of everything." And she seemed to fall
a-brooding.

Newman watched her a while, and then he said suddenly. "Ah, Mrs. Bread,
you are too fond of my lady!"

She looked at him as quickly. "I wouldn't have you say that, sir. I
don't think it any part of my duty to be fond of my lady. I have served
her faithfully this many a year; but if she were to die to-morrow, I
believe, before Heaven I shouldn't shed a tear for her." Then, after a
pause, "I have no reason to love her!" Mrs. Bread added. "The most she
has done for me has been not to turn me out of the house." Newman felt
that decidedly his companion was more and more confidential--that if
luxury is corrupting, Mrs. Bread's conservative habits were already
relaxed by the spiritual comfort of this preconcerted interview, in
a remarkable locality, with a free-spoken millionaire. All his native
shrewdness admonished him that his part was simply to let her take her
time--let the charm of the occasion work. So he said nothing; he only
looked at her kindly. Mrs. Bread sat nursing her lean elbows. "My lady
once did me a great wrong," she went on at last. "She has a terrible
tongue when she is vexed. It was many a year ago, but I have never
forgotten it. I have never mentioned it to a human creature; I have kept
my grudge to myself. I dare say I have been wicked, but my grudge has
grown old with me. It has grown good for nothing, too, I dare say;
but it has lived along, as I have lived. It will die when I die,--not
before!"

"And what IS your grudge?" Newman asked.

Mrs. Bread dropped her eyes and hesitated. "If I were a foreigner,
sir, I should make less of telling you; it comes harder to a decent
Englishwoman. But I sometimes think I have picked up too many foreign
ways. What I was telling you belongs to a time when I was much younger
and very different looking to what I am now. I had a very high color,
sir, if you can believe it, indeed I was a very smart lass. My lady was
younger, too, and the late marquis was youngest of all--I mean in the
way he went on, sir; he had a very high spirit; he was a magnificent
man. He was fond of his pleasure, like most foreigners, and it must be
owned that he sometimes went rather below him to take it. My lady was
often jealous, and, if you'll believe it, sir, she did me the honor to
be jealous of me. One day I had a red ribbon in my cap, and my lady flew
out at me and ordered me to take it off. She accused me of putting it on
to mak