But in spite of the good lady, I generally managed to linger behind, or run before, and so to look at things in my own way. Once, as she was rehearsing the history of a certain picture, I made my way out of the room, and catching sight of some pretty things through an open door at the end of the passage, I went in to see what I could see. Some others were following me when the housekeeper spied them, and bustled up, angrily recalling us, for the room, as we found, was a private _boudoir_, and not one of those shown to the public. In my brief glance, however, I had seen something which made me try to get some information out of the housekeeper, in spite of her displeasure. "Who are those little girls in the picture by the sofa?" I asked. "Please tell me." "I gives all information in reference to the public rooms," replied the housekeeper, loftily, "as in duty bound; but the private rooms is not in my instructions." And nothing more could I get out of her to explain the picture which had so seized upon my fancy. It was a very pretty painting--a modern one. Just the heads and shoulders of two little girls, one of them having her face just below that of the other, whose little arms were round her sister's neck. I knew them in an instant. There was no mistaking that look of decision in the face of the protecting little damsel, nor the wistful appealing glance in the eyes of the other. The artist had caught both most happily; and though the fair locks I had admired were uncovered, I knew my little ladies of the beaver bonnets again. Having failed to learn anything about them from the housekeeper, I went to old Giles and asked him the name of the gentleman to whom the place belonged. "St. John," he replied. "I suppose he has got children?" I continued. "Only one living," said old Giles. "They do say he've buried six, most on 'em in galloping consumptions. It do stand to reason they've had all done for 'em that gold could buy, but afflictions, sir, they be as heavy on the rich man as the poor; and when a body's time be come it ain't outlandish oils nor furrin parts can cure 'em." I wondered which of the quaint little ladies had died, and whether they had taken her to "furrin parts" before her death; and I thought if it were the grey-eyed little maid, how sad and helpless her little sister must be. "Only one left?" I said mechanically. "Ay, ay," said old Giles; "and he be pretty bad, I fancy. They've got him in furrin parts where the sun shines all along; but they do say he be wild to get back home, but that'll not be, but in his coffin, to be laid with the rest in the big vault. Ay, ay, affliction spares none, sir, nor yet death."