vertise the fact, do they? And Catherine advertises it rather too
much. But I don't know anything actually against her."

"Thanks. And what of this Johanna McCall? Where did she originally come
from? Do you know?"

Her face softened visibly. You could see that Miss McCall held a warm
place in her heart.

"Yes. I can tell you at once. Her foster-father used to be a bailiff
of my father's in the good old days when money wasn't so hard to get,
and even land seemed to yield a richer harvest. The old man died at
his work, and as he was a widower, with this little adopted daughter
living with him, he begged Father to see that she came to no harm.
And Father promised. And when she grew old enough, he gave her work
in the house. Sort of secretary--Mother's help, you know. But when he
remarried, Paula changed all that, and took her for her own sort of
companion-lady's-maid. I believe she would have left us before now,
after the treatment she has had, if it hadn't been for Father being her
guardian, so to speak. But none of us can ever forgive Paula for the way
she has treated her. It's disgraceful."

"And yet your father never complained?"

"My father never _saw_. But the girl has been made a pack-horse from the
minute Paula set her foot in this house. She seemed to have marked her
down for her own, and Johanna has had to suffer in consequence. Such a
nice little thing, too! It's common knowledge that she is engaged to Mr.
Tavish--though we've heard nothing definitely. But it will be an
excellent match. More in her own station of life; and they're both such
dears.... Anything else, Mr. Deland?"

"Nothing else, thanks."

"Then I'll be off. And back again in twenty minutes. And in the
meantime, Mr. Deland, you won't--you won't think too hard of my Angus
will you? Even if he had done such a terrible thing whatever reason
would he have had to do it?"

"Has he any debts, Miss Duggan?"

She laughed a little and shrugged her shoulders. "Heavens, yes! Heaps of
them. That was what Father had against him. Father used to say that a
poor man should own nothing, because there was little chance of paying
it back. But so have I, for the matter of that. Over a hundred
pounds--and bridge debts. But it's my only recreation, Mr. Deland, and I
can easily pay it back, so that it's nobody else's business, is it? But
I wouldn't have Paula know for worlds! She'd make my life misery."

"As she'd make any one's--who stood in her way," thought