"Well, so do I think—and when I came ’ere where no one knowed anything about me excepting I was Uncle’s niece, I says to myself, says I, ’You act up to your looks, Caroline Cushion—an’ then you can talk about your children same as the rest.’ I didn’t trouble my ’ead about a ’usban’—I ’adn’t never thought about ’im. So when folks asked me—like you yourself, miss—I just prims up my mouth and shakes my ’ead, and they sees as ’e weren’t up to much, and they says no more. Sometimes I’ve thought as it were a bit onfair on ’im, pore chap, an’ ’im never done me no ’arm—but—there.... I couldn’t stop to think about ’im. ’Twere the boys as I wanted—an’ they _did_ comfort me so, miss, an’ I don’t know _’ow_ as I can ever give ’em up." "But I see no reason why you should." "Ah, miss, you speaks so kind because you do think, ’She’s ill, poor thing, and we must yumour ’er,’ but what’d the Reverend say? You may depend as that there Mrs. Robinson ’ll never let it alone. What’ll ’e say? An’ if ’e says as I’ve got to tell every one I ain’t no married woman an’ never ’ad no children, I’d rather not get well. I couldn’t face it, miss. Because I _can’t_ feel as the Lard’s very angry with me—I can’t." "Mrs. Cushion, will you let me tell Mr. Molyneux, and see what he says?" Mrs. Cushion sighed. "I suppose ’e’ll ’ave to be told, an’ you’d tell him more straight-forward nor I could. It’s all so mixed up like. You see, them boys ain’t never done no ’arm to any one—they so far off and all—an’ I will say this, miss, they’ve give me a sort of ’old over young growin’ chaps I wouldn’t ’ave ’ad without ’em. Many’s the young chap as ’ave listened to a word from me about drink and the like, because ’e’s thought, ’There, she knows as it’s only natural—she’s got some of ’er own—she won’t be too ’ard on me’—and they did like me, I knows they did—they did indeed, miss." I thought of the hobbledehoys and the shy, furtive presents of eggs and honey and tight little bunches of flowers, and an occasional rabbit—how come by it were perhaps better not to inquire—and the inarticulate lingering, the waiting for intelligence they were too shy to ask for—I thought of these things, and I knew that Mrs. Cushion spoke the truth. "Now, you, miss," the tired, whispering voice went on, "if I may say so, you _looks_ unmarried; and yet, I do believe as you understands." "I do, I do, Mrs. Cushion." "It seemed some’ow as if it _’ad_ to be, and yet there’s no one ’ates lies and bedanglements more than me. An’ there I’ve been and gone and done it myself. But I ain’t going to own it!" Mrs. Cushion added almost fiercely. "Not if I ’ad to let Snig’s an’ leave these parts. I’d _far_ rather die." By this time she was as flushed as she had been pale before, and I had to tell her she mustn’t talk any more, but leave it all till the morning, when we’d consult the vicar.