se standing near overheard. Bessie and the girl stopped quarrelling.
The landlord, startled, cast a sly eye in Bessie's direction. She came
up to the bar.

"What's that yer sayin'?" she demanded. The man repeated his remark.

"Well, I dessay there was," said Bessie--"I dessay there was. I s'pose
there's plenty of 'em. Where do I get 'em?--why, I get 'em at Bedford,
of course, when I goes for my money."

She looked round defiantly. No one said anything; but everybody
instinctively suspected a lie. The sudden silence was striking.

"Well, give me my change, will yer?" she said impatiently to the
landlord. "I can't stan' here all night."

He gave it to her, and she went out showering reckless good-nights, to
which there was little response. The door had no sooner closed upon her
than every one in the tap-room pressed round the bar in a close gathering
of heads and tongues.

Bessie ran across the green and began to climb the hill at a rapid pace.
Her thin woollen shawl blown back by the wind left her arms and bosom
exposed. But the effects of the spirit in her veins prevented any sense
of cold, though it was a bitter night.

Once or twice, as she toiled up the hill, she gave a loud sudden sob.

"Oh, my God!" she said to herself. "My God!"

When she was half-way up she met a neighbour.

"Have yer seen Isaac?" Bessie asked her, panting.

"'Ee's at the Club, arn't 'ee?" said the woman. "Well, they won't be up
yet. Jim tolt me as Muster Perris"--Muster Perris was the vicar of
Clinton Magna--"'ad got a strange gen'leman stayin' with 'im, and was
goin' to take him into the Club to-night to speak to 'em. 'Ee's a
bishop, they ses--someun from furrin parts."

Bessie threw her good-night and climbed on.

When she reached the cottage the lamp was flaming on the table and the
fire was bright. Her lame boy had done all she had told him, and her
miserable heart softened. She hurriedly put out some food for Isaac.
Then she lit a candle and went up to look at the children. They were all
asleep in the room to the right of the stairs--the two little boys in one
bed, the two little girls in the other, each pair huddled together
against the cold, like dormice in a nest. Then she looked,
conscience-stricken, at the untidiness of the room. She had bought the
children a wonderful number of new clothes lately, and, the family being
quite unused to such abundance, there was no place to keep them in. A
new frock