"It does seem very poorly," remarked Mrs. Todhetley, stooping over the young mortal (which was not cross just now, but very still and quiet), and letting it clasp its little fist round one of her fingers. "No doubt it is the teeth. If the children do not get better soon, I think, were I you, Hester, I should speak to Mr. Duffham." The advice seemed to strike Hester Reed all of a heap. "Speak to Dr. Duffham!" she exclaimed. "Why, ma'am, they must both be a good deal worse than they be, afore we does that. I'll give 'em a dose o' mild physic apiece. I dare say that'll bring 'em round." "I should think it would not hurt them," assented Mrs. Todhetley. "They both seem feverish; this one especially. I hear you have had Cathy over," she went on, passing to another subject. "Sure enough us have," said Mrs. Reed. "She come over yesterday was a week and stayed till Friday night." "And what is she doing now?" "Well, ma'am, Cathy's keeping herself; and that's something. She has got a place at Tewkesbury to serve in some shop; is quite in clover there, by all accounts. Two good gownds she brought over to her back; and she's pretty nigh as lighthearted as she was afore she went off to enter on her first troubles." "Hannah told me she was not looking well." "She have had a nasty attack of--what was it?--neuralgy, I think she called it, and been obliged to go to a doctor," answered Hester Reed. "That's why they gave her the holiday. She was very well while she was here." I had stood at the door, talking to the little ones with their watering-pot. As the mater was taking her final word with Mrs. Reed, I went on to open the gate for her, when some woman whisked round the corner from Piefinch Lane, and in at the gate. "Thank ye, sir," said she to me: as if I had been holding it open for her especial benefit. It was Ann Dovey, the blacksmith's wife down Piefinch Cut: a smart young woman, fond of fine gowns and caps. Mrs. Todhetley came away, and Ann Dovey went in. And this is what passed at Reed's--as it leaked out to the world afterwards. The baby in the basket began to cry, and Ann Dovey lifted it out and took it on her lap. She understood all about children, having been the eldest of a numerous flock at home, and was no doubt all the fonder of them because she had none of her own. Mrs. Dovey was moreover a great gossip, liking to have as many fingers in her neighbours' pies as she could conveniently get in. "And now what's amiss with these two twins?" asked she in confidential tones, bending her face forward till it nearly touched Mrs. Reed's, who had sat down opposite to her with the other baby. "Sarah Tanken, passing our shop just now, telled me they warn't the thing at all, so I thought I'd run round." "Sarah Tanken looked in while I was a-washing up after dinner, and saw 'em both," assented Mrs. Reed. "Hetty's the worst of the two; more peeky like."