"You don't believe it, Bill?"

"Not a bit of it."

"Oh, I am glad!" cried Miss Burge, clapping her hands. "It would have been shocking if it had been true."

"Did you go down and see Miss Thorne?"

"No, dear; I came to tell you directly."

"You ought to have gone down and asked her about it, Betsey," said her brother stiffly.

"Ought I, Bill dear? Oh, I am so sorry! I'll go down at once."

"No, you won't: I'll go myself. Perhaps, poor girl! she has spent the money because it was wanted about her brother, and she's been afraid to speak about it, when of course, if she'd just said a word to you, Betsey, you'd have let her have fifty or a hundred pound in a minute."

"No, indeed, Bill dear, for I haven't got it," said Miss Burge innocently.

"Yes, you have, dear," he said, s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g up his face, and opening and shutting one eye a great deal. "Of course she wouldn't take it from me, but she would from you, you know. Don't you see?"

"Oh, Bill dear, what a one you are!" cried little Miss Burge. "I'll go down to her at once."

"No," he said; "I must go. It's too late now; but another time you just mind, for you've got plenty of money for that I say, Betsey: I've got it, my dear--it's her mother!"

"What's her mother, Bill dear?"

"Spent the money, and she's took the blame," he cried triumphantly.

"Oh! I am glad, Bill. But oh, how clever you are, dear! How did you find it out?"

"It's just knowing a thing or two; that's all, Betsey. I've had jobs like this in connection with business before now. But I must be off."

"But won't you take me with you, Bill?"

He hesitated for a moment or two, and then said--

"Well, you may as well come, Betsey; but mind what you're about, and don't get making an offer, for fear of giving offence."

"Would it give offence, Bill?"

"Yes, if you didn't mind your p's and q's. You hold your tongue, and leave everything to me; but if I give you a hint, you're to take Miss Thorne aside and make her an offer."

"It's my belief that Bill will be making her an offer one of these days," thought little Miss Burge; "but she don't seem to be quite the sort of wife for him, if he is going to bring one home."

Mr William Forth Burge was not long in changing his coat and he met his sister in the hall, twirling his orange silk handkerchief round and round his already too glossy hat; after which they walked down arm-in-arm to the school, to find the head pupil-teacher in charge, and the girls unusually quiet, a fact due to the vicar being in the cla.s.s-room, in company with George Canninge, both having arrived together, and then shaken hands warmly, and entered to have a look round the school.

Mr William Forth Burge and his sister both shook hands with the other visitors, and were then informed that Miss Thorne was suffering from a terribly bad headache. She had been very unwell, the pupil-teacher said, all the morning, and had been obliged to go and lie down.

Hereupon the visitors all began to fence, the object of their call being scrupulously kept in the background, and they one and all took a great deal of interest in the girls, and ended by going away all together, expressing their sorrow that poor Miss Thorne was so unwell.

The vicar and George Canninge walked up the town street together, after shaking hands with Mr and Miss Burge, and discussed politics till they parted; while Mr William Forth Burge, slowly followed with his sister, also talking politics but of a smaller kind, for they were the politics of the Plumton people, and the great man began to lay down the law according to his own ideas.

"They were both down there about that school money, Betsey, as sure as a gun. But just you look here: people think I'm soft because I come out with my money for charities and that sort of thing; but they never made a bigger mistake in their lives, if they think they can do just what they like with me; so there now."

"That they never did, Bill," a.s.sented his sister.

"I look upon them schools as good as mine, and if there's to be a row about this money, I mean to have a word in it, for I'm not a-going to have that poor young lady sat upon by no one. I've hit the nail on the head as sure as a gun, and if it isn't the old lady that's got her into a sc.r.a.pe, you may call me a fool."

"Which I never would, Bill," said little Miss Burge emphatically; and together they toddled back home.

CHAPTER THIRTY SIX.

SOMETHING BY POST.

It was a most extraordinary thing, but, probably from uneasiness, Mrs Thorne was the first down next morning. Hazel had had a sleepless night, and it was not till six o'clock that she dropped off to sleep heavily, and did not awaken till past eight, when, hot, feverish, and with her head thick and throbbing, she hurriedly dressed herself and went down.

Fate plays some strange tricks with us at times; and on this, the first morning for months that Hazel had not received the letters herself, Mrs Thorne was there to take them.

"Three letters for Hazel," she said to herself. "Dear me, how strange!

Three letters, and all bearing the Plumton postmark!"

She changed the envelopes from hand to hand, and shuffled them in a fidgety way, as if they were cards.

"I feel very much displeased, for Hazel has no right to be receiving letters from gentlemen; and I am sure if Edward Geringer were here he would thoroughly approve of the course I take. She shall not have these letters at all. It is my duty as Hazel's mamma to suppress such correspondence. Often and often have I said to her, 'Hazel, my child, under any circ.u.mstances never forget that you are a lady.'"

There was another close examination of the letters, and then Mrs Thorne went on--

"No young lady in my time would have ventured upon a clandestine correspondence with a gentleman; and now, to my horror as a mamma, I wake to the fact that my daughter is corresponding with three gentlemen at once. Oh, Hazel, Hazel, Hazel! it is a bitter discovery for me to make that a child of mine has been deceiving me. I wonder who they can be from."

Mrs Thorne laid the envelopes before her with the addresses uppermost.

"'Miss Thorne, The Schools, Plumton All Saints,' all addressed the same.

This, then, is the reason why poor Edward Geringer has been refused."

Here there was another examination of the postmarks.

"Three gentlemen, and all living at Plumton. Now, really, Hazel, it is not proper. It is not ladylike. One gentleman would have been bad enough, in clandestine correspondence; though, perhaps, if there had been two it would be because she had not quite made up her mind. But three gentlemen! It is positively disgraceful, and I shall stop it at once!"

This time, in changing the position of the letters, Mrs Thorne turned them upside down.

"I remember at the time poor Thorne was paying me attentions how Mr Deputy Cheaply and Mr Meriton, of the Common Council, both wished to pay me attentions as well; but, no: I said it would not be correct. And I little thought, after all my efforts, that a child of mine would be so utterly forgetful of her self-respect as to behave like this. Ah, Hazel! Hazel! It is no wonder that the silver threads begin to appear fast in my poor hair."

Mrs Thorne placed the envelopes beneath her ap.r.o.n as the two children came bustling in, one with the cloth, and the other with the bread-trencher, to prepare the breakfast.

"Hazel's fast asleep, ma, and we're going to get breakfast ready ourselves."

"I'm sure I don't know why your sister can't come down, my dears," said Mrs Thorne pettishly. "It is very thoughtless of her, knowing, as she does, how poorly I am."