“That, probably, she would not know how to make, but she can read, and has Mrs. Warne to fly to for light.” “I put out the currant jelly for the pudding, and she has spread it over the rabbit on top of the onion sauce.” Arminell was unable to restrain a laugh. “I went down to see her dish up, and that is what she has done. Poured the onion sauce over the rabbit and heaped the currant jelly a top of that. Whatever shall we do? The last cook was bad enough, but she did not spoil good food.” “What induced her to do this?” “She says that she has been told to put currant jelly with hare, and so she has put it with rabbit, as she saw the jelly-pot set out on the kitchen table for the pudding.” “And the pudding?” “Is without anything. We cannot eat the rabbit. That is spoiled; and the pudding is nothing without red currant jelly. Whatever will Mr. Welsh do for his dinner?” “But the girl had Mrs. Warne’s Cookery Book on the table for reference?” “Yes, but she also had a sensational novel.” Arminell laughed again. “I am afraid the education she has received has garnished her head much in the same fashion as she has garnished the rabbit, several good things jumbled together, making an unpalatable whole. I will go and see what can be done.” “I have given the girl notice.” “Surely not, Mrs. Welsh. She has but just come to town.” “I spoke sharply to her, and girls now-a-days will not bear a word. She flew out at me and said she would not remain another hour in the house. Girls give themselves such airs. She knows my extremity, how long I have been without a cook.” Arminell descended to the kitchen, but Thomasine was not there. The boiled rabbit stood on the table crowned with onion sauce and crimson jelly. Near it lay, wide open, a book, not so thick as Mrs. Warne’s Cookery Manual, and Arminell stooped to look at it. The book was Gaboriau’s “Gilded Clique,” much stained and cockled, as if it had been wet through, and then dried. Arminell turned it over; it was her own copy, which she had flung from her when in the Owl’s Nest, to arouse and arrest the attention of Captain Saltren. She could not doubt that it was the identical book, for her name was pencilled on it, and the water had not effaced the pencil scrawl. She did not know, what was the fact, that the book had undergone two immersions, and had twice been recovered by Patience, and that on the last occasion she had passed it on to her daughter. Arminell stood turning over the disfigured volume, speculating on how it had come into Thomasine’s hands, and thinking of the occasion when she had last read it; and so thinking, for a moment she forgot the rabbit with its incongruous garnishment, and why she had descended to the kitchen. She was roused from her reverie by the maid-of-all-work coming in excitedly. “Oh my, miss! What do you think? Thomasine has flown out at missus, and packed up her things in a bundle, and gone.” “Thomasine gone!”